The Woodward Academy, Year 8

Chapter 12: May - Crossroads

David was, once again, glad for his ComfortCloak coat.  The temperature on Hohocoro was only forty-five degrees, and it was a bit windy.  In Earth terms, Hohocoro was called Iceland.  David wasn't sure why it was called that, as he saw no ice from his perspective.  Perhaps the Earth side was icier.

What he did see, however, were eighteen-foot tall men and women wearing large fur garments.  They took little notice of him as he walked among them.  These were the Ice Giants.  Again, he wasn't entirely sure why they were called that, as they were not made of ice, either.  He wasn't going to chance offending one by asking, however.

He did have to trouble someone, though, as he needed directions.  He looked around for someone who didn't look busy.  After several minutes, he found someone who was obviously a child, though already a fair bit taller than himself.

"Excuse me," David asked politely.

"Whatchuwan?" the boy asked gruffly.

"I was wondering if you could help me.  I'm trying to find Mt. Lidenbrock."

"Huh?"

Suddenly, a dark shadow crossed over David.  He looked behind him to see a huge and gruff-looking man.

"Whatchu wan wit my son?"

"Sorry, I was asking him for directions."

"Whereyagon?" the man growled.

"I'm trying to find Mt. Lidenbrock."

"Li-denn-brock" the giant repeated slowly and, apparently, uncomprehendingly.  He turned and bellowed - at least, it sounded like a bellow to David - to another giant, this one a woman.  They spoke rapidly in a language full of guttural sounds mixed with odd-sounding slides in tone and very strange sounding little ticks mixed in here and there.

The woman turned to David.  "Youwan Li-den-brock Mounan, yes?"

"Yes," David said with a smile.  "Mt. Lidenbrock."

"Is danerous," she warned.

"Thank you, I know that," David said politely.  "I have to go there, anyway."

She raised her large arm and pointed.  "Is that way."

"Thank you... do you know how far?"

"Thousands of steps."

And if those are your steps, you mean a whole bunch of miles...

"Will I reach it today?"

The woman snorted.  "Not on dose pyun-ee legs."

David chuckled.  "How long, can you guess?"

"Two day," she said, holding up two fingers.  "If you fast."

"Thank you very much," David said.

The woman just grunted.  David didn't know if it was a friendly grunt or a disinterested grunt, so he didn't say anything further.  He bowed slightly to the male giant, waved to their son, and then headed off in the direction he'd been given.

David could have made the trip faster through Haven, but he was a bit worried about getting off course that way, plus, with all the shit he'd been going through lately, he felt that wandering for a couple days through the wilderness was damn near a vacation for him, and so had no incentive to speed up the trip.

When he stopped for the night, he deliberately kept himself busy working on OmniPortal calculations.  If he kept his mind occupied, he wouldn't think about home.  He wouldn't think about Zyla.

And maybe he wouldn't cry himself to sleep this time.

"You wanted to see me, Jack?" Vivian asked.  They were standing in David's outer office, which confused her.  Though Jack was the senior ranking officer of field personnel while David was gone, generally no orders would be given in his absence.

"Hey, Vivian.  We have something of a situation."

"What's going on?"

"The weres are making another heavy push."

Vivian shrugged.  "This would be like, what, the fifth or sixth time?"

"This one's more serious.  They're keeping up pressure in the west, so Ark North is actually tied up over there.  This push here in the east seems to be rather focused.  They've already managed five miles."

"Ouch."

"Yeah."

"So... what do you want me to do about it?" Vivian asked.

"I'm just passing along orders from above.  Btt DeSantis wants Troop 42 to head north and scout out what the weres are doing."

"Troop 42 is absent a leader.  You know that."

"Yes, and so does DeSantis.  For now, he wants you and Giendia to head up north to just east of Treacle, and find a place to hunker down and wait for David.  They're going to send a swift to let him know what's going on, and where to find you."

"Swifts can't go that far north, can they?" Vivian asked.

"No, it'll wait for him in Ramius.  He has to land there if he's taking an ice dragon, which was his plan."

"Why send us now?  Why not just wait until he gets back?"

"This push is happening so fast, they're concerned that there will be no path north if we do that.  They want you to investigate the rear flank, to see if there is a way to attack them from there.  They're also hoping that David will find some way for Troop 42 to be annoying to them while you're there," Jack said with a grin.

Vivian just grunted in amusement.  She asked, "So... how are we supposed to get back to deliver the information... you know, when we're done annoying them?"

"The swift we send will stay with David, so you can send the information."

"Not sure how Jailla's gonna like that, but okay."

"Jailla?"

"David's familiar."

"Oh, right.  I'm sure he'll adjust.  In any case, you two need to head out soon.  Stop in this area here," he said, showing her on a map.  "We're fairly certain this area is clear right now.  If you don't feel safe... er, you know what I mean," Jack said, smiling at her.  Vivian nodded, not returning the expression.  "Your orders are to move toward the coast, and then north, so that David has a chance of finding you."

"And when we've ended up in Ramius ourselves?" she asked.

"If that happens, hop on an ice dragon and get yourselves south.  David will have to fend for himself.  We both know that's not a problem for him."

"No, it's not," Vivian agreed.  "Okay, we'll be on our way as soon as we get our gear together."

"Good show.  I'll let DeSantis know.  And Vivian?"

"Yeah?"

"Keep your head down, okay?"

"You know it."

Well, there it is.  I wonder what the ice giants call this thing.  Obviously not "Mt. Lidenbrock".  Wonder where that name came from, too.  Not that it matters, I guess.  Up we go...

David began to climb the mountain.  The outer portion wasn't too terribly steep; it looked like he would be able to mostly walk up it, with perhaps a few spots where he'd need to climb a short way.  Of course, reaching the top was only the first part of the challenge.

It was well past midday by the time David reached the peak of the disturbingly active volcano.  The heat wafting up out of the caldera was oppressive, but Kalagasakalayo, the magical dragon bracer that had been given to him by the cave dragons at the end of his fifth year of school, protected him from all but some major discomfort.

Now for the fun part... David thought sarcastically to himself.  The inside of the volcano was much steeper than the outside, and, of course, falling off meant potentially landing in lava.  There were several streams of it oozing out of lower portions of the rim.

Moving slowly and carefully, David climbed down the inner wall of the volcano.  By the time he reached bottom, over an hour later, he was exhausted.

And I've still gotta climb back up that damned thing!

Turning, David felt like he was in a good approximation of Hell.  The stench was awful, the heat was unbearable, and it wouldn't be hard to imagine wails of terror and torment.  Smoke and steam billowed up out of cracks and openings in the rock.  Orange glows were visible not too far beneath the surface.  The only minor hope he had was, since there were openings in the rock, an explosive eruption wasn't too likely... at least not while he was standing there.

"Okay," David said, coughing, "I'm here.  Now what?  I think I missed the highway sign saying, 'Firebird, next exit...'"

David began to walk, stepping carefully and paying attention to what was around him.  He had to detour several times, and backtrack once, because his path was blocked.  Finally, he neared the very center of the caldera.  The heat was at its worst here, and there was a fairly large crevice in the surface of the rock.

But no firebird.

Well, shit.  Did I come all this way for nothing?  This is where he's supposed to be.  Then again... maybe he's actually... in the volcano?  Dragon bracelet or no dragon bracelet, I'm not climbing down into magma.

After some further consideration, David shrugged.  "Might as well try it..."  Taking a deep breath, David shouted, as loudly as he could, "HELLO?  I'M LOOKING FOR THE FIREBIRD WHO IS SAID TO LIVE HERE!  ARE YOU HERE?"

David was nearly knocked on his ass in surprise as the crack in front of him immediately erupted, lava spewing for several feet in every direction.

Out of the middle of the bubbling magma rose a fiery being, in the shape of a bird.  It rose a dozen feet above David, looking down on him.  David could sense what was coming, and raised Kalagasakalayo, activating it to form the fiery buckler.  He did so just in time, as the firebird's flames erupted from its mouth and blasted at David with all the might and fury the bird could muster.  For long moments, this went on, until the firebird relented.

"Who disturbs my slumber?" the firebird demanded.  It's voice, oddly, did not screech as one might think a bird would, nor did it crackle or hiss like a fire might.  It was, in fact, a rumbling groan of a voice.

David shook his head slightly to clear it after being blasted by a magical blow torch.  Finally, he said, "My name is David Stroud.  I have been told that you guard the location of the final piece of the primal aegis."

"I do..." the firebird said.  "Do you think I'm going to tell you where to find it?"

"Probably not without making me jump through hoops," David replied.  "No one else has been cooperative, I see no reason to expect you will be."

"Arrogant," the firebird barked.

"No.  Tired," David said.  "Tired of playing games.  Tired of fighting a war.  Tired of people telling me how fucking evil I am, and that I have to fix it.  Tired of no-fucking-body telling me how!"

The firebird stared at him for long moments, then settled to the ground.  The land beneath him blackened further than it already was.

"You are very close now," the firebird said.

"Close to what?" David demanded.

"Your end.  Or your beginning, depending on which way you want to look at it.  The events which will define you are close at hand, demighost.  You should watch your every step, your every word, your every deed."

"And do what?  It's not like I can just not do the things that are causing me trouble.  I have to do them, or we will lose the war!"

"Losing yourself is much worse, I assure you."

"For me, maybe."

"For everyone."

David stared at him.  The firebird stared back, but didn't offer anything further.

"Yeah, sure.  Whatever.  Look, do we have to go through some ritual before you tell me, or are you just not going to tell me where to find the next dragon?"

"I will tell you.  But, understand, David of Woodward... he will not be as pleasant as I have been."

"Why in the world would you call me that?  I haven't set foot on school grounds in almost a year now."

"Where your body is, and where your heart is, do not necessarily need to be the same."

"I'm not sure my heart is at Woodward, either.  If what I've been told is true...  Do you know whether it is or not?"

"Of course I do.  No, I will not tell you.  That is something you must discover in your own way."

"Typical," David said.  "You sure you're not a dragon in disguise?"

The firebird actually chuckled.

"The dragon you seek is twelve miles to the northwest.  You will not find his home any more hospitable to you than mine."

"In other words, it's another volcano?"

The firebird tilted its head just so.

"Joy."

"Is there more you seek from me, demighost?" the firebird asked solicitously.

"Do you have a name?"

"Pontiac."

David snorted.  "Your name is Pontiac?" he asked incredulously.

"You have a problem with my name?" the firebird asked menacingly.

David coughed and tried to control his giggling.  "No, no.  It's nothing.  It's just... an Earth thing."

"Ah."

"You wouldn't, by any chance, be the same firebird who once aided Lord Woodward?"

"I would."

"Would you still come to his aid, if he needed it?"

"Lord Woodward died a very long time ago.  He has no need of aid.  Should you, however, survive your challenges with your soul intact, you may call on me if you have need of me."

"How would I do that?" David asked.

The firebird described the process.  It was blessedly not a convoluted process, so David would have no trouble remembering it.

"Thank you... but can I ask why?"

"Why?"

"Yes.  I mean, I'm grateful, don't get me wrong, but... getting the help of a firebird is supposed to be very difficult.  Why are you actually offering without me even asking?"

"For the future."

"...are you sure you're not a dragon?" David asked again.

The firebird snorted, flames shooting from his beak.  "Go now, demighost.  Your time is short."

David muttered to himself, "Time is always short.  Why can't she be tall and buxom, or at least average height with nice legs?  No, always short.  She's apparently a fast little bitch, though, because she keeps catching up with us..."

The firebird had heard the remark, and a rumbling laugh echoed across the caldera.  Then the bird took to the sky, looping until he plunged back into the deep crack he had come out of.

David sighed and turned around, heading for the nearest cliff face.  He'd be lucky to make it out of the caldera and down the mountain before sundown.  He would have to travel to the dragon the next day.

 David spent a day making the trek from Mt. Lidenbrock to... wherever the hell he was now.  What stood before him was a mountain even taller than Lidenbrock, and also an active volcano.  This one, however, had a cave at its base.

I hope that's where the fucking dragon lives...

Taking a deep breath, he ventured into the entrance.

The further in he walked, the more uncomfortable he became.  The temperature was rising rapidly.  David estimated it was already over a hundred and ten in the cave, and he'd only gone fifty feet.  Though ComfortCloak made the claim that their garments would keep your body comfortable at any temperature, they apparently had their limits.  David took off his coat and stored it in his Conjuring Room.  His shirt was plastered to his skin, and sweat was dripping off his brow.

Determinedly, he pressed on.

He was thankful that the being he sought was lounging around the next corner.  David turned the bend and jolted, as the dragon was right in front of him, staring him down.

"You are?" the dragon hissed hoarsely.

"David Stroud.  I assume you've heard of me already..."

"You make large assumptions for such a small creature."

"Well, it's just that all the others had heard of me ahead of time."

"Perhaps they have more interest than I do," the dragon offered.

David sighed.  "Well, if you haven't heard of me, then-"

"Another assumption.  You are full of yourself, aren't you?"

David growled to himself.  "Well, have you heard of me or not?"

"Impertinent!  What right have you to demand information from me?"

David's growl was louder this time.  "Okay, fine.  My name is David Stroud.  I am a member of the Callamandian Army.  We are in a war with Vrudena, and I have been tasked with trying to assemble the primal aegis.  I was told that you have the final piece of it, and I've come to ask you if I could please have it."

"No," the dragon said.

"No?" David echoed, astonished.

"Do you have a hearing problem, creature?"

"Why the fuck not?"

"Because without a hearing problem, you would have heard me," the dragon said snarkily.

"I meant why won't you give me the damned crystal?"

"Again demanding!  Why do you believe I must answer to you?"

"Fine.  Whatever.  Great.  Just wasted a week of time.  Thanks for nothing, you overstuffed iguana."

As David turned to go, the dragon said, "So easily you give in, yet in other things you are far more tenacious."

"Yeah, well maybe I'm sick of dragon bullshit," David snapped.

"Maybe we are sick of your bullshit.  Did you consider that?"

"I don't much give a fuck if you're sick of me or not.  Each of you only has to see me once.  I have had to put up with you assholes five times."

"You poor soul," the dragon said.  "The salvation of your people is worth so little as that?"

"As far as I can tell, the shield will not actually save us.  Hell, I don't even know how to make the fucking thing work, because you assholes won't tell me!"

"Again with the demands," the dragon said.

"I made no demand of you.  I'm simply telling you bluntly that the five of you collectively have been about as helpful as a hole in the head!"

"Maybe you're simply not smart enough to understand our help."

"Maybe you're not really helping, and you just say mystical bullshit like that to make people think you're not a total asshole," David retorted.

"And you expect to gain my cooperation through insult and sarcasm?"

"No, I don't expect to gain your cooperation at all.  Insults and sarcasm are my way of venting the crap you've been feeding me back at you."

"You come here, you disturb my rest, you make demands, you insult me, and yet I am the arrogant one?"

"Yes, you are the arrogant one.  I came here because people are dying.  You're being uncooperative because... why, again?  Oh, right, because you're a dragon, and the whole lot of you don't seem to give jack shit about anyone but yourselves!"

"Who should we care about?  You humans?  Petty, squabbling little creatures you are, overestimating your importance and believing yourselves master of what you see.  Why should we care what happens to you?"

"You know what?  I guess you shouldn't.  Fine.  Have a nice life.  I realize the deaths of thousands of humans means virtually nothing to you, so I have nothing to say to you at this point.  I hope your volcano collapses around you."

David turned and walked away.  The dragon roared, and flames flew along the side of the cavern, trapping David inside.  He turned, annoyed.

"What?" David demanded.  "First you bitch that I disturbed your rest.  Now you won't let me leave!  Make up your motherfucking mind!"

"It is a true fool who would anger Ethraigaush, king of the fire dragons!"

"Whatever, Your Majesty," David said as disdainfully as he could manage.

Ethraigaush let loose with another set of flames.  David stood, untouched and unfazed.  He was still protected by Kalagasakalayo, and he assumed that the dragon knew this.

"You wear protections from me, but there are other means by which I can punish you."

"Such as?" David inquired.

"Perhaps I shall burn your home to the ground.  With your family inside of it."

"Don't make me find out what it takes to kill you," David warned.

"You would dare challenge a dragon?" Ethraigaush jeered.

"Nobody threatens my family," David growled.  Suddenly, the cave was filled with gigantic fireballs.  David used again the spell he'd used to destroy the art gallery at Pendergrast Manor.

Ethraigaush flinched in surprise at the power of the fireballs, but, being a fire dragon, they were of little danger to him.

"You would start a war that the humans are ill-equipped to fight," Ethraigaush said.

"I am not a human, dragon.  Is your clan so stupid they don't know which race to attack?  Or do they simply not care whether they get the right target or not?  Any of us bipeds would do, eh?"

"You would truly set yourself against all dragonkind, for a few short-lived humans?"

"Nobody hurts my family." David repeated as strongly and firmly as he could.

"What if your precious king were to order them killed?"

"Then I would need a new country, and Callamandia would need a new king."

"Really.  And what if you, yourself, were to endanger them?"

"That cannot be allowed to happen," David replied.

"What if your family were to endanger each other?" the dragon asked coldly.  "Whom would you kill?"

"I will not harm my family," David said.

"Why not?"

"What do you mean, why not?  They're my family!"

"Yet you are willing to blithely kill hundreds of werewolves.  You've killed many members of your own species.  What makes them different?  Why should your family get special favor?  Because they worship you?  Because they pant after you like little lap dogs?  Because they show you their fleshy little bodies and allow you to poke into them whenever you please?" the dragon taunted.

"Because they actually care about me!" David shouted in anger.

"Oh, poor little demighost, unloved by but a few.  And so, you only care about those who care about you?"

David remained silent.  He knew he didn't have the words to express himself properly, and he also knew that he was only digging a bigger hole with the dragon.

"Enough," David said.  "I don't need your abuse.  I've got enough sources for that already.  Good-bye, dragon."

As David turned, the walls once more blazed with flame.

David said over his shoulder, "You do realize I can just walk through that, right?  I mean, even without the bracer, I can just become a ghost."

"Tell me something, creature," Ethraigaush said.  "I have insulted you, attacked you, and threatened your family.  Yet you haven't actually attacked me in return.  Your fireballs, you knew were no threat."

"You knew your attacks were pointless, too," David said.

"But you didn't attack me when I threatened your family.  You have done so to others.  Why not me?"

"You are not my enemy."

"And the human who threatened your beloved, he was your enemy?"

"He was a criminal.  Criminals are everybody's enemy."

"Interesting," Ethraigaush mused.  "Your anger is focused, then.  Answer me truthfully, creature.  If two of your family were fighting to injure or even kill, what would you do?"

"It would probably depend on who it was exactly, but most likely I would separate them by magical force to calm the situation down."

"And, again, truthfully.  Why do you not apply this technique to your enemies?"

"They aren't worth the effort," David said.  "Controlling my desire to hurt them takes a great deal of concentration and willpower.  They are simply not worth the expenditure of mental energy."

"But your family is."

"Of course."

"Then, here is the 'how' that you have been seeking, creature.  Unless you can see every being as an extended member of your family, you will always be a danger.  To them, to your friends and loved ones, and to yourself."

"That would be very hard to do, when tasked with killing them."

"Sometimes, families must treat each other harshly, for their own good.  Yet, there must always be a certain respect and connection, even when 'strong discipline' is what is required."

"You're telling me I need to respect and love Vrudenans, while I'm gutting out their livers."

"In a word, yes."

"That's... going to be difficult to learn to do."

"And you have very little time to learn it, I'm afraid."

"Great," David said.

A bright flash of red grabbed David's attention.  Ethraigaush extended his hand.  David held his out, palm up, and the dragon dropped a deep red crystal, round in shape, into his hand.  David held it up, but saw nothing particularly special about it.  He could feel, though, that it was powerful.  He tucked it into his coat pocket with the others.

"Thank you.  Don't suppose you'd tell me what to do with them all now?"

"Don't press your luck, creature.  That is not my job."

"Okay... well, tell me this, then.  Does the fact that you've given me the crystal, mean that I will beat the darkness within me?"

"Not necessarily.  It merely means you have the ability to do so, still.  This is why you have not yet been told how to activate the primal aegis.  Until you have defeated your evil self, it will remain beyond your grasp."

David nodded.  "That makes sense, I guess.  Seems like we could have avoided all the running around if you guys had just stored them all in one place."

"In one place, they could all be stolen at once, or fought for.  Widely separate and hidden, they were much safer.  The primal aegis contains immense power, creature.  Wield it well... if you can wield it at all."

"Right.  And, um... if I do defeat the evil inside me, who do I ask about how to activate this stupid thing?"

"That answer will come, when it is needed."

"Right.  Of course.  Thanks.  I guess.  I'll let you get back to your rest now."

"Most kind of you, creature," Ethraigaush said sarcastically.

"You're still an ass, though," David muttered to himself.

The dragon snorted a small ball of fire to indicate he'd heard the remark, but he didn't respond otherwise.

David walked out of the cave, oriented himself, and began walking.  He had to return to the place he'd arrived, so he could get a ride home on an ice dragon.  It would take two days.

"Vivian, do you think David's going to be okay?" Giendia asked.

"You mean on his trip north?  He should be fine."

"No, I mean with, you know, is he going to be... a good guy or a bad guy?"

"Oh," Vivian said, and frowned.  "I don't know.  I don't really want to think about him going bad like some demighosts have... it does seem to be a common path for them, though."

"What do we do if he does?"

"Get the fuck out of the way and run like hell," Vivian said bluntly.

"But-"

"G, neither you, nor I, nor all of Scout Company 1 has anything that could stop David if he was truly of a mind to be trouble.  All you can do at that point is save yourself.  He's had seven years of school, trained with fuckin' gargoyles, for Christ's sake... knows six ways to kill you before you can even say 'ouch'.  If he goes bad, you don't want to be in the same district."

"Don't you think there's anything we can do to keep that from happening?"

"Just be his friend, G.  The more friends he has, the more chance he has of fighting it."  Vivian had taken to calling Giendia 'G' out of a desire to save her tongue from falling off from all those vowels.

Giendia frowned.  "When we get through with-" she started to say, but Vivian held up her hand.

"I heard something."

Giendia listened closely, turning her head repeatedly.  Suddenly, she nodded to Vivian, and pointed in the direction of the noise.  Whispering, she said, "It sounds like several people."

"Let's get moving," Vivian said.  The two started heading away from the noise at an angle, that way they would hopefully get out of the path of whoever it was more quickly.

Suddenly, out of the bushes in front of them, two werewolves emerged.  Vivian took the time to note they were female, and they weren't wearing anything military.  That was all she noticed, however, because the left one lunged at her.  Vivian's wand was already in her hand, and the were was vaporized soon thereafter.  The second were fell to an arrow from Giendia's bow.

"We've got to go," Vivian said.

"Get on my back," Giendia told her.  Vivian didn't argue, but immediately jumped up onto Giendia.  Giendia was away in a flash, galloping as fast as she could through the thick forest.  She had to weave and dodge, as there were no paths here. 

Suddenly, a werewolf jumped out from the trees, and grasped at Vivian.  Vivian punched the were in the face, and then blasted her with an energy ball to the chest.  The were flew backwards, and her head slammed into a tree.  Brains smeared across the bark as the body flew past the tree.  Giendia reached back and grabbed Vivian, who had slipped out of position.  Giendia pulled her back to a stable spot, and ran on.

A minute later, Two weres dropped out of trees, right in front of Giendia.  She reared up and kicked each of them in the face with a hoof, sending them sprawling onto the ground, their faces caved in from the kick.  Giendia jumped over them, dashing away into the forest, Vivian holding on for dear life.

It seemed that there were many weres after them, however, as they kept hearing more voices, more footfalls.  Vivian took to firing blasts blindly into the trees in every direction, to keep the weres from getting too close.

Eventually they broke from the trees on a lake shore, and Giendia ran along it.  The bank was an eight-foot drop, so Giendia was careful to keep away from the edge.

Vivian was nearly thrown off when Giendia slid to a stop.  Vivian could hear them now: werewolves up ahead, barking and snarling.  Vivian slid off Giendia's back onto the ground.

"Now what?" Vivian asked, not really talking to Giendia.

"I don't know," she said.  "I hear them on all sides of us."

"Can you swim?" Vivian asked.

"No.  In general, centaurs are horrible swimmers.  If that lake is deeper than I am tall, I'd drown in it."

"Shit," Vivian said, gripping her wand and waiting.  The first weres emerged from the trees, and were cut down by a spell and an arrow.

"This is too close for arrows, really... don't you have another weapon?" Vivian asked.

"I have my knife," Giendia said.

"You might be better off with that."

Giendia stowed her bow, and then pulled her knife, which turned out to be a fifteen-inch long heavy blade that looked like it could fell small trees.

"Now that's a knife!" Vivian gasped.  "You've been carrying that the whole time?"

"I don't like close combat," Giendia said with a frown.

As six more werewolves emerged from the forest, Vivian said, "Well, you're about to not like what's about to happen, then."

For a few minutes, the two ladies fought off their attackers.  Were bodies lay scattered on the ground, and a few had fallen into the water.

"I don't think we're going to survive this," Vivian said as she sliced open the throat of another were female.

Giendia didn't say anything for a moment, but then, all of a sudden, an arm reached under Vivian's armpit and around her back, then a hand gripped her shoulder.

"One of us is," Giendia said. 

"Giendia, what are you doing?" Vivian demanded, struggling to get free.

"What I was fated to do.  Tell my father I did my duty, and tell David I love him," she said, and she heaved with all her might, spinning in place, using her horse muscles to full effect.  Vivian went flying out over the water a good fifty feet before she splashed into the lake.

Sputtering, Vivian came up to the surface.  She saw Giendia fighting off the werewolves, but she could also now see how many there were.  She had no chance.

"Giendia!  Jump in!  You can't fight them all!"

Giendia turned just enough, in her fight, for Vivian to see that it was already too late.  A knife was sticking out of Giendia's side, blood oozing from the wound.  As Vivian watched, four weres - all of them female - pounced on Giendia.  Two of them wound up with broken necks, but the remaining two tore at her.  Giendia's scream of pain tore at Vivian.

The weres, using spears and pole weapons that had hooks on them, dragged Giendia into the trees, away from the lake.  Vivian fired energy balls after them, but then a dozen of them started to fire back at her.

Reluctantly, she allowed herself to sink below the surface of the lake to avoid getting hit, losing sight of her friend for the last time.

As she swam away, there was only one thought running through her mind.

What the hell am I going to tell David?

 David landed in Ramius, thanking his transporter for a fairly smooth ride.  As he came out of the departure hut, the falconswift was sitting in a tree just down the path.

"Waiting for me?" David asked as he walked up to the falconswift.  The bird, of course, said nothing.  David reached out and took the parchment off the bird's leg.  He started to unfold it, then looked up.  The falconswift hadn't moved.  David raised an eyebrow, then shook his head and finished unfolding the message.

"Well, shit," David said to himself.  "Back to work, I guess.  I wonder what the fuck the Vrudenans are up to now."

David conjured Jailla out of his Conjuring Room, and de-statue-ized him.

"How long have I been in there?" Jailla demanded.

"Several days.  I'm sorry, did you want to freeze to death?"

"I might as well have stayed at the Manor."

"No, we have work to do.  We have to meet up with Vivian and Giendia, and then perform a scout mission."

David started walking, Jailla riding on his shoulder.  Suddenly, the swift flew past and landed in a tree a hundred yards ahead.

"We seem to have a follower," Jailla said.

"Yeah.  He's been assigned to us to deliver any information we might find out."

"I'm no longer good enough?" Jailla demanded.

"Hey, I didn't ask for him, so don't bite my head off.  He was assigned by Ark South."

"You don't even work for them!"

"Right now, I think I work for anyone who needs me.  This is bad, Jailla.  Really bad."

Jailla chirped.  "It is a very long way home from here.  Do you plan to walk the entire way?"

"No.  I'm going to travel through Haven.  You will have to catch up with me... unless you want to go back in the statue."

"I will catch up with you.  Where are we going?"

"Basically, to Treacle.  Just east of there, anyway."

"Very well.  It will take me about two days."

David nodded.  "Go on and go, then.  Don't push yourself.  I think we'll probably be in that area for a while."

"Right."  With that, Jailla winged off.

David stopped when he was under the swift.  "I don't know if you can track me when I'm in Haven and invisible.  If not, you'll just have to find me when I stop."

The bird looked at him, but made no noise.  David just grunted, then stepped into the trees.  He faded to ghost form, then pushed himself into Haven, and finally became invisible, so no weres would see him moving.

Taking a deep breath, David took off.  At his top Haven speed, he would be at Treacle near the end of the day.

David stared east, at the sunrise.  He had arrived in the area as expected, but he still had to find Vivian and Giendia.  He wasn't exactly sure how to do that, until he remembered he had the Dalmajak Cynosure with him.  He pulled it out of his CR, and unwrapped it carefully.

This little ball, given to him at the end of his fourth year by a girl who was glad to have her stolen property back, could tell him where anything or anybody was... so long as it was close enough.

David held it and whispered, "Troop 42."

The device spun, and ultimately misted, not giving a direction.

"Shit.  Guess they're not close."

The message the swift had been carrying said their orders were to move toward the coast, then north, if they needed to change position, so David would head east.  He'd check every mile, to see if he could find them.

Looking over his shoulder to the tree the falconswift was sitting in, he asked, "You coming?"

The bird remained silent.  David wondered if they made any noise besides the screaming they would do when traveling at high speed.

Sighing, he began his trek toward the sun.

It took David half the day to find Vivian.  She was huddled down in a small clearing, the tent set up.  She was trying to keep watch, but it was misting, making it hard to see anything.  David's appearance startled her at first.  Then, she wrapped her arms around him and gripped him tightly.  The tears flowed quick and hot.

David held her for a long moment, not yet knowing exactly what was wrong.  He rubbed Vivian's back, trying to calm her down.  It took over ten minutes before she was at all coherent.

"What's wrong?" David asked, concerned.  "Where is Giendia?"

David suddenly recognized the look on Vivian's face.  His own had worn it once.

"Show me," David told her.

"I..."

"Show me," David demanded coldly and firmly.

Vivian nodded.  "It's this way."

As they walked, David said, "Tell me what happened."

"We were sitting in the forest, just waiting for you to show up.  We were talking, and suddenly we heard something coming through the forest.

"We tried to get out of the way, but when we did, we ran right into some other weres.  We took them out, but then the chase was on.

"We got to this lake, and suddenly we were surrounded by them.  David, they were all over the place!  Dozens of them!"

"How did you survive?" David asked curiously.

"Giendia.  She grabbed me and threw me out into the lake.  She saved my life.  But with the time it took her to do that, the weres were all over her.  I tried to fire at them from the water, but there were so many, I had to duck under the water to avoid getting hit, and... by the time I came back up, it..."

"It wasn't your fault, Vivian," David said.  "Thankfully, it also wasn't mine.  Who gave you our orders?"

"Well, Jack told me about them.  He said they came from DeSantis."

David grunted.  After that, they walked on in silence.  The misty rain grew to a drizzle, and the two pulled their coats tighter around them for warmth.

Finally, Vivian stopped.  "She's... through there.  I'm sorry, David, I can't... I can't see that again."

"Wait here," David said.  He pushed his way through some brush, and came face to face with what was left of his friend.

Her face had not been touched, except for one knife slash.  It was done, David knew, so that she would be recognizable to others.

A spear ran through her human body, from right to left, puncturing her liver and stomach.  A large knife had been plunged into her heart, right through her sternum.  Her horse body had a half-dozen weapons run through it or stuck into it.  Her tail had been cut off, and her legs were all broken.  Her blood coated her fur and stained her skin.  It had been long enough that maggots were covering parts of the body.

David wanted to say many things to Giendia.  He wanted to tell her how much he loved her, how important she was to him.  He wanted to tell her how sorry he was for not protecting her better.  He wanted to tell her how much he would miss her, how he had been looking forward to a future where they spent more time together... but none of those words would come to him.  Instead, he uttered the only words that could make it past the pure, black rage filling his entire soul.  As he reached up and ran his hand across Giendia's cheek, he growled, "I promise you, those who did this will pay the price."

Chanting the spell as calmly as he could, David watched as Giendia's body was vaporized, thus denying the filthy animals any opportunity at having more fun with it.

Not that they will live long enough to do anything more.

As David turned away from his final duty to Giendia, a physical darkness encased not just his face this time, but his entire body.  It was as if a swarm of small insects was surrounding him.  It was the aura of the undead: an embodiment of evil and malevolence.

When David stepped back through the brush, Vivian shrank from him.  He looked almost crazed.

"You show me who did this," David said.

"David, I can't..."

David grabbed her coat and yanked her forward until their noses were actually touching.  Looking this close into David's eyes was causing such terror in her that her legs were barely capable of holding her up.

"SHOW ME!" David bellowed.

"I don't know where they are!" Vivian cried.  "They weren't soldiers, David, they were women!  Just... civilian women!"

David let go of Vivian, but pushed her backward so forcefully she nearly fell, stumbling over her feet until she grabbed a nearby tree for balance.

David once again conjured the Dalmajak Cynosure.  Holding it in his hands, he said, "Show me the bitches who killed Giendia."

The cynosure could only give him this information because it was already known who the killers were.  In seconds, the device's inner ring pointed the way.  David put it away, and moved in that direction.

"David, there were dozens of them!" Vivian said.  "Maybe a hundred!"

"Good," David said coldly.

"How is that good?" Vivian demanded.

"Because it may take that many before I'm satisfied," he replied.  Nowhere in his mind was he contemplating the words of Ethraigaush, or Diana, or even Zyla.  He had only one thought:

No one hurts my family.

The two came upon the were settlement almost by surprise.  It was hidden well among the trees.  David saw mostly women, and some older men, along with several dozen children.  They didn't seem to mind the rain.  David, himself, didn't even notice it at this point, though the drizzle was turning into a thunderstorm.

The first were to see them, charged.  It was an apparently fit young adult woman.  She lunged at David, who grabbed her by the throat and dug his fingers in.  She screamed in pain as he ripped her throat out with his bare hand, allowing the body to drop to the ground.

"Who's next?" David asked coldly, drawing his sword.

Two weres ran at him, grabbing spears as they came.  David leapt at the first, skewering her in the chest with his sword and slamming her to the ground with the force of his lunge.  He landed on her and leapt at the second, spinning in a blur.  His foot connected with her jaw, snapping her head over and sending her spinning to the ground.  David chanted a spell and then slammed his foot down onto the back of her head.  Her brains oozed out from under his boot.  He didn't even notice.

Two more started to charge, but David blasted them both with a single bolt of lightning, and their bodies disappeared in agonizing screams of pain.

For a brief moment, everyone, including David, froze.  Then, as if some unheard voice had screamed, "Go!", a half-dozen weres charged at once.

For her part, Vivian hid behind a tree.  She had already had her run-in with these weres, and knew she would die if she entered the fight.  David, on the other hand, was nearly a blur.  Vivian couldn't actually make out the moves he was using.  All she saw were werewolf bodies falling to the ground left and right.  Man or woman, it didn't matter in the slightest.  None of them could stand up to him.  Vivian noticed that David's aura was getting darker, thicker, as he carried on.  She couldn't make out his actual shape, even when he was standing still - not that he was doing a whole lot of that at the moment.

Vivian moved closer as the numbers dwindled and the bodies piled up, some of them on top of each other three deep.  The children of the village were all cowering against the outer wall of a large tent, perhaps their eating hall.  Several of the women stood around the children, guarding them.

David didn't give a damn what their job was.  He started hacking into them mercilessly.  Seeing that, they rushed at him, trying to take down the evil specter that was destroying their village.

As the last of the attacking females collapsed to the ground, dead, David turned his eyes toward the one remaining. She stood, immobile, guarding the children of the village.

Vivian saw David start to move, and she was aghast at what she suspected he was about to do. She ran to get in front of him.

"David, no, you can't do this!" she cried.

"Get out of my way," David snarled.

"David, please!" she said, putting out a firm hand against his chest, trying to stop him from moving forward.

David lifted his hand and blasted her with a strong energy ball. It sent her flying ten feet, and she landed with a hard impact on the ground.

The female were stepped forward. Through her hybrid-induced slurred speech, she said, "You will not get to these cubs while I live."

David grabbed her by the throat, squeezing tightly, cutting off her air. Though werewolves were stronger than humans, it would have taken three of them to break David's grip on her at that point.

Raising his blade, he placed it against her throat just below his hand.

Gazing deep into her eyes, hoping she could see Hell in his, he said, "That was the plan." Slowly, he drew the edge of his sword against her throat. Blood spouted instantly, and her death was assured, but David didn't stop. Only when her body fell to the ground, his hand still holding her head by its throat, did he stop.

"Fucking bitch," David spat coldly, tossing her head to the side.

As he turned to the first child, he put away his sword. Vivian was struggling to her feet, and she thought that perhaps he was reconsidering, that he wasn't going to commit an act this heinous.

Her hopes were dashed when he yanked his wand with such vehemence that it blasted sparks across the entire area. Vivian, nearly panicked, ran. She almost fell in the mud, but she kept her footing, and was able to place herself between David and the children.

"You can't do this!" she screamed.

"Watch me," he replied coldly.

"They're just children!"

"They grow up into them!" David screamed back at her, pointing to the dead bodies of the adults. "Vile, murderous, foul, sub-human animals!"

"Right now, what makes you any better than them?" She demanded. "You're about to murder pure innocents! Judging who they might become is something only a god can do! Who do you think you are?!"

Vivian knew she was playing not with fire, but with a raging inferno. She was dancing on a knife edge, and one wrong word would destroy everyone involved.

Suddenly, David's aura started to darken further. "I am Vengeance," he said in a low growl. Raising his voice, he said, "I am Justice!". Finally, as a lightning bolt crashed nearby, thunder splitting the night, he screamed, his voice showing an almost maniacal rage, "I... AM... DEATH!" His aura was so black at this point it was almost impossible to see his face. He had the appearance of a cloud of ink floating in water.  Except for his eyes.  They glowed with an intense, blood red light as strong as any laser beam.  This was a demighost in full bloom, emitting all of the rage and hatred it had ever endured, all at once.

Vivian was shaking in terror. She had never seen something so malevolent in her life. She couldn't recognize this as her long-time friend... and right at that moment, he wasn't. She made her decision.

"No. I won't let you," she said boldly, taking a firm stance, facing David head on.

Vivian stared in total shock as David raised his wand, pointing straight at her heart. "I can kill you as easily as them," he told her bluntly, his voice seemingly devoid of any emotion at all.

Vivian could barely think in the terrorized state she was in. She was casting about for anything to say, anything to do, that might make a difference.  No words came to her, no thoughts or ideas arrived to aid her in her time of dire need.

Finally, in a flash of distant lightning, she caught a glimmer in front of her, glinting even through the darkness of David's aura, and that gave her one small hope.

YES! she thought to herself. God, I hope this works...

Reaching out rapidly, Vivian slammed her hand into David's chest. This had absolutely no impact on David whatsoever, but that wasn't Vivian's plan, anyway.  Despite the painfully cold, almost electric feeling gripping her fingers where David's aura surrounded them, they curled around the amulet she had been grabbing for.

Suddenly, a ghostly image appeared in between them. An image of two girls, smiling warmly at David.

"What would she say about what you're doing?"

"She is already leaving me!" David snarled.  "So what she thinks hardly matters!"

"That's not certain at this point!" Vivian retorted sharply.  "If you do this, that will be absolutely set in stone!

"If you do this, she will condemn you until the day she discorporates! She will lose, for all time, the only support she has left! What do you think will happen to her then? 

"And what will happen to Grace?  She needs her Uncle David!  She cannot go through life without her father, without you, and with her mother forever destroyed by what you have done!

"You want revenge for the family they have taken from you, but what about the family you still have?  If you do this, you will be the one hurting them!  You will cause them pain and suffering!  You will be responsible for their despair and misery!  YOU CAN'T DO THAT TO THEM!" Vivian screamed at the top of her lungs, shaking the amulet, causing the image to waver back and forth.  She was almost hysterical now, hoping against hope that David, the real David, her friend David, was still inside, would listen, would turn from this abominable choice.

For the longest moment, Vivian stared into the darkness that was David's face. She couldn't make out his features through the dark aura. It almost seemed to her as if the aura was solidifying, tightening around David like some kind of oily, malignant shell. She saw the tip of his wand gathering energy, growing brighter and brighter with an intense crimson light.

I tried, Zyla... I'm sorry... Vivian thought bleakly.

Suddenly, David let loose a howl of rage, pain, grief, despair, hatred, and self-loathing that caused the hairs on every person present to stand on end. It lasted for a solid thirty seconds, drowning out the thunder and the rain, and then David leveled his wand. Vivian cringed, turning her face away from coming death as the brilliant crimson light shot out, its power immense.

By the time the light died away, the entire were encampment was gone.

But the children, and Vivian, remained.

The aura that had shrouded David lifted like a mist, slowly floating away on the breeze. The were children, who were still terrified and shaking, looked at him, wondering what came next.

David looked at them.  "Can any of you understand me?" he snarled.

Several of the older boys nodded.

"North is that way," David said, pointing. "You go that way. If you ever set foot in my country again, I will kill you without warning. Do you understand me?"

The older children, those who understood what he was saying, all nodded in terror.

"Get away from me," David said coldly.

The older children turned, barking and nipping at their younger siblings and neighbors, running into the trees.

David dropped his wand where he stood and staggered off, back toward their camp.

Vivian grabbed his wand and followed behind him. She was afraid to talk to him, afraid of reawakening the evil beast she had just come face to face with, and nearly been killed by.

By the time they had returned to their camp, the rain had intensified further and was coming down in torrents. David did not enter the tent, but instead went and sat against a tree. He cupped his hands in front of himself, and he formed an energy ball. It was a deep violet in color, and though its size was small, she could tell it contained an enormous amount of power.

Fighting her fear, Vivian knelt next to David.

"What are you going to do with that?" she finally asked, after a solid minute of hesitating.

"Nothing useful," David said, his voice hollow. She knew the wetness on his face was not due to the rain. "It won't do what I want it to."

"What is it you want it to do?" she asked carefully.

"End things," David said bluntly. He threw the energy ball away, and though it was a good thirty feet into the trees, the blast wave still washed over them. David seemed not to even notice. "If I had a way to kill myself right now, I would."

"David, that wouldn't fix anything..."

"Wouldn't it?" David demanded, looking into her face. "It would get rid of one of the most dangerous monsters in this world!"

"David, you're not a monster. You're just a man."

"Weren't you paying attention?" he demanded. "I just nearly killed a few dozen kids! For nothing!" Taking a shuddering breath, he continued more quietly. "I nearly killed one of my best friends. I nearly killed you..." David said. He cupped her cheek with his hand, gazing into her eyes, his tears challenging the rain. She could almost feel the despair radiating off him.

"But you didn't," she said quietly.

"I would have," he said. "You don't understand how close it was." Vivian looked at him, but remained silent. "I had cast all but the last syllable of the last word of the hex. There's no way in hell you would have lived. I was within a quarter-second of murdering you," he said, in a shaky whisper, barely audible above the rain.

"But you didn't," she said more strongly.

"Only because you stopped me," he said, finally dropping his hand from her cheek and looking down at the ground.

"David, I didn't stop you. What, you think I have the ability to stop a Wizard Adept like you? David, you make me look like a fucking techno! All I did was talk! You stopped you. You're a good man who has seen too much, lost too much, been asked to do things no one should ever be asked to do. I'm not surprised that you finally couldn't take it anymore. I'm just glad you were able to stop yourself. You're not a monster, David. You're not evil. I'm living proof."

David shook his head, not willing to accept that. He turned to face away from her, staring out into the darkness for a moment. Finally, he turned back to her, and in a voice that was as weary and as despondent as she had ever heard, David said, "I wanna go home."

Vivian pushed herself against his side, laid her head on his shoulder, and wrapped her arms tightly around him. There they sat, drenched and shivery, as miserable as either of them had ever been.

"I know," she said softly to him. "Me, too."

 "Swift for you, sir," the soldier said, coming to attention.

"Let's have it," DeSantis said.  The soldier handed it over, then left when dismissed.  "It's from Troop 42," he told Arkigo Schwarzkopf.

"Good.  Maybe they've got good news for us."

DeSantis read the note, then said, "Oh, shit."

His tone strongly concerned the arkigo.  "What?" he asked.  DeSantis just handed him the note.

"What the fuck happened out there?" Schwarzkopf wondered allowed.

"I don't know, but with them out of action, we're flying blind."

"No.  You know where they're going."

"Bolmont, it looks like."

"Yep."

"Send them a note back.  Let them know what's going on.  Maybe David's not as bad as the report makes it sound."

"He's not prone to shirking his duties, sir," DeSantis objected.

"He didn't write the report.  His capadra may be trying to protect him, depending on just what went on out there."

DeSantis nodded.  "Very well."

"Shit," David said when Vivian showed him the note.  After that, he turned over, lay back down, and stared at the wall some more.  This was what he'd been doing for a day and a half now.  Vivian didn't know how long he was going to be this way, and she didn't know what to do to bring him out of it.

Watched him save himself from one danger, just to lose him to something completely different...  He just can't win.

Olissa was walking the upstairs hallways, doing a routine check of rooms, making sure that everything was the way it was supposed to be.  She discovered that, in one room, it definitely was not.

"Can I ask what you're doing, Mistress?"

"I'm packing," Zyla said.

"Why?"

Zyla looked at her.  "That's obvious, isn't it?  I'm going home."

"Why?" Olissa asked again.

"Because I don't belong here," Zyla said.  "Now, could you please go find Grace and let her know that we'll be leaving in about an hour?"

"As you wish," Olissa said politely.  She left the room, and quickly made her way to an empty room.

"Kipple," she said after snapping her fingers twice.

A pixie appeared floating above her head.  The pixie said, "What can I do for you today?"

"I need you to go to Gwen's shop, and tell her that she needs to get here immediately.  Tell her it is about Zyla.  Can you do that for me?"

"Yes, ma'am!" Kipple said.  She then popped out of existence.

Olissa sighed.  The pixies were useful for getting messages from place to place, with the mirror system put out of action by the war.  Unfortunately, most pixies would only travel through a very limited area.  Kipple wouldn't even cover the entire city of Bolmont.  Olissa just hoped that Gwen got there in time.

"What do you think you're doing?" Gwen demanded, standing in the doorway of Zyla's room.

"Leaving.  Is that okay with you?" Zyla asked angrily.

"No, quite frankly, it's not," Gwen said.  "You're just going to run out on him while he's not even here?"

"I told him the last time I saw him that I would probably be leaving."

"What happened to worrying about the war?  The latest news is that they're headed this way."

"Gwen, stop.  You know there's no way this house is going to stand up to all of that."

"This house has... I think it was sixteen... full layers of protection on it.  I helped put those spells in place.  No one's getting through them anytime soon."

"Right," Zyla said dismissively.  "If I have to, I'll just travel south.  I have some distant relatives near Senesty."

"So, if that was your plan for avoiding the war, what the hell did you come here for in the first place?"

"You know that."

"No, I'm not sure I do.  You apparently lied to David about being scared about the war, you've told us all repeatedly you don't like David's lifestyle, so, no, I really have no fucking clue what you're doing here."

Zyla looked at her.  "I wanted to see what David was like in his own home."

"And you've actually seen him here for... what, like four, five days?"

"And in that time, he sexually abused someone!" Zyla said.

Gwen said, "That was your fault."

"Excuse me?" Zyla snapped.

"You heard me.  Olissa got punished for trying to get David to open up about his problems.  But the only person he talks about that shit with is you.  But right now, because of your attitude, he doesn't really feel like he can tell you anything negative about himself without pushing you away.  So, he didn't talk about it.  None of us knows, still, what was bugging him that day.  And that's on you."

"So what the hell am I supposed to do?" Zyla demanded.

"You're supposed to talk it out with him when he gets back.  Before you screw up the lives of everyone who lives in this house for the next several years, you are supposed to actually communicate.  You owe him that much."

"I owe him?" Zyla scoffed.  "He-"

Gwen didn't let her continue.  Her voice started out harsh, and got louder and nastier as she spoke.  "Yes, you owe him.  Who was there for you when Grace was born?  Who was there for you when Grace got Wilburwarts?  Who was there for you when you got sick with the flu, and needed someone to look after things?  Who was there for you when your house needed repairs?  Who was there for you when your factory workers were ready to tear apart your business?  Who was there for you when Joe was attacked and in the infirmary?  Who has been there for you for the last ten months, helping you hold your goddamned life together?" 

"Yes, you fucking well owe him, so you are going to unpack your shit, park your ass until he gets back, and have an adult discussion with him, or you can accept, for all time, the title of World's Most Ungrateful BITCH!"

With that, Gwen whirled and left the room.  Zyla stared after her, slowly sinking to the bed and staring at the empty doorway for a long time without moving.

 Down the hall, Gwen went into her mother's room.

"Mom, you remember that thing we were talking about?"

"Getting the folks together?" Denise asked.

"Yeah.  I think that needs to happen, and soon."

"See what I can do.  It's going to take several days."

"Fast as we can.  I'm not sure we have much time left."

 "It doesn't make any sense," David finally said, sitting up.

Vivian looked over at him.  She'd been reading a book, since she had nothing else to do.  There was no point in standing guard: the tent was nearly impossible to see from any distance, and it was protected from attack.  Anyone who was crazy enough to try to come inside... well...  that wouldn't have been wise.

"What doesn't make sense?" she asked him.  It was the first thing he'd said in over a day.

"The Vrudenan attack.  That note said they were headed for Bolmont... but it also said they were thirty miles from the coast."

"Right... Bolmont is on the coast..."

"But the note said they were advancing east.  Bolmont is southeast.  Why go to the coast before turning south, if Bolmont is your target?"

"To cut off those of us to the north?" she offered.

David snorted.  "We're probably the only ones here!"

Vivian shrugged.  "I don't know.  That's beyond my job description."

"Hmph.  You're fired."

"Thank you, but I don't think you have the authority," she said with a soft smile.

David slumped back on his pillow.

"It just doesn't make sense," David said, mostly to himself.

Vivian shrugged to herself - David wasn't paying attention - and went back to her book.

Vivian had just gotten herself engrossed in her book again when David suddenly sat up once more.

"Shit!"

"What?" she asked, concerned.

"I hope I'm wrong, but I think I know what the Vrudenans are doing."

David suddenly conjured parchments and an InkyQuill out of his Conjuring Room.  He flipped through the parchments to find the one he wanted, then pulled out a map.  He placed a straightedge on the map, and then cursed.  Vivian looked up, but didn't ask.  If he had a solution to the problem, he'd certainly tell her.

The next time Vivian looked up, about an hour later, David had scrawled things over about three feet of parchment.  He was still scribbling furiously.

He looked up for a second and saw her looking.  "I wish this shit could be done with a calculator..."

"Why can't it be?" she asked.

"Because, though we call them equations, they're not.  At least, not in the Earth sense.  These equations are a special form of divination known as arithmancy.  You have to be able to 'cast' the equation.  Thankfully, I'm pretty good at divination... though I've never studied arithmancy before."

"So, the numbers can actually... tell you stuff?"

"Yes.  It's... well, think of it like runic interpretation.  The numbers, like the runes, are a medium through which the divination is performed.  It's just that each medium is especially good at conveying certain kinds of information."

"And what information are the numbers conveying today?"

"Something really, really bad."

"Oh.  In that case, don't tell me."

"I'm not sure yet, anyway.  I'm not done with the equation."

"You've been working on it for an hour."

"This stupid thing can take all day."

"Oh.  Have fun.  I'm going back to my book."

David just grunted.

"Aw, fuck me," David groaned.

"Okay," Vivian said lightly, setting down her book.

David just glared at her.

"Oh.  That wasn't an invitation.  Poo," she said with a fake pout.  Growing serious, she said, "what's the matter?"

"I know where the Vrudenans are actually going."

"It isn't Bolmont?"

"No."

"Where then?"

David looked at her so she would realize he was serious.  "Mt. Woodward."

"Tell me again why the weres would want to attack a school?" Vivian asked.  They had packed up the tent and were on the move in less than ten minutes.  They'd been traveling rapidly for over an hour now.

"They don't give a shit about the school.  It's just in their way.  They want the OmniPortal."

"The... what?"

David spent the next ten minutes explaining to her about portals, and the OmniPortal.

"And you think this thing is at the school?"

"Probably under it, inside the mountain.  Though it could be a thousand feet above it.  Wouldn't that be fun."

"I don't understand."

"Portals don't have to exist on the ground.  Most of the ones we've found are, in fact, in the middle of the ocean.  They can exist anywhere... including a thousand feet in the air.  I'm not saying that's where it is, I'm just saying it could be."

"Shouldn't we send a message to them?  We could use Jailla..."

"Not until we're sure.  Given our last message, and where we're going, I'm not sure they'd believe us without a visual sighting at the school.  If they had left us the falconswift, I'd send them a preliminary message.  The swift could get back to us fast enough to be reused.  Jailla could only make one trip in time.  We're only a day away, in any case."

"Yeah, right through the were army."

"Okay, yeah.  A couple days away, then."

"Not funny," Vivian grumped.

"Wasn't joking.  You remember the little game we played to get away from that prison camp?"

"You mean after you raped me?" she asked with a grin.

David snorted.  "I didn't hear you bitching about it at the time..."

"Anyway, yeah... you want to do that again?"

"Yeah.  As soon as we get close, you can morph to a cat, and I'll go invisible, and follow you.  That way, even if they see you, they shouldn't think anything of it."

"Yeah, but if they do, I'm screwed.  I can't morph back fast enough if they attack."

"I can cast defensive spells when invisible," David assured her.

"Good to know.  Stay close."

David just grunted.

"Holy shit," Vivian gasped.  They were standing a good two miles from Mt. Woodward.  Any closer, and they would start to encounter werewolves.  There were thousands of troops besieging the mountain.  "Okay, now can we send Jailla?"

David closed his eyes to check something.  "No."

"Why not?"

"There are demons here."

Vivian paled.  "They wouldn't hurt a bird, would they?"

"Who the hell knows?  They're demons.  But that's not the point.  The demons are preventing any long-distance spellcasting.  I can't conjure the report to HQ through Jailla.  And this report will need to be too involved for anything that Jailla could actually carry."

"So... what, then?"

David turned to her.  "The closest point of communication is Pendergrast Manor.  There's a falconswift there, in case of military emergency.  Get to the house, report in, then stay there."

"What are you going to do?"

"Someone has to prepare the school," David said.

"You're not going in there?" she gasped.

"You know they can't hurt me," David said.

"But... what if they attack the school?"

"I'm almost certain they're going to.  That's why it needs to be ready.  We cannot let them obtain the OmniPortal, under any circumstances."

David turned to face Vivian, and he put his hands on her arms.  "I'm giving you two orders.  First, report in, and then defend the house, if necessary."

"And second?" she asked.

"Do Not Die," he said, his tone utterly serious.  "I have no one left to save me out here without you."

Vivian stepped close and they kissed passionately for a long moment.  David held her close and tight, and they forgot about the war for a few seconds.

Once they ended their kiss, David caressed her cheek.  "It's dangerous for me to say this to you, but... I love you," he said.

"I love you, too, David.  I'll be careful, I promise."

"You better be.  You end up as a ghost, and I'm gonna come kick your ass all over Haven."

Vivian giggled.  "I'll just sit in your bedroom every night, watching you get laid."

"Fine with me.  I don't mind an audience," David said with a mischievous grin.

Vivian blushed.

"Go on," David said.  "But be careful!  Send Cupcake this way when you get there, that way I know you made it."

"You sure she'll be safe?"

"She can approach from seaward.  They wouldn't be able to touch her.  She knows how to take care of herself."

"Okay.  Good luck," she said.

"You, too."  They kissed again, and then they separated.  David watched her go for a minute, but once she was out of sight, he faded to invisibility and headed for the mountain.

As David approached the entrance to the mountain, having passed through several thousand troops and managing not to kill any of them, he was suddenly blocked.

What the... aw, fuck!  Ghost prevention fields!  Now what?

It took David a minute to remember.

Okay, so, the secret entrance it is.  I hope they don't know about that...

David made his way over to the cliff.  He had to find the way down, which was luckily far enough away from the mountain that the GP fields weren't affecting it.  He climbed slowly down the cliff, watching his foot placement and keeping his handholds firm, until he'd finally reached the small ledge, which led to the tunnel.

David hurried now, making it through the tunnel to the small room with the rock lift in it.

The only problem was that the lift was at the top of the shaft.

"Now how the hell am I supposed to call it down here?" David asked no one.

He needn't have worried.  All rock lifts were crafted by the Sirius, Cy, & Burnetyx Company, and they all knew where they were needed automatically.  The rock lift arrived in the room only a few seconds after David wondered how to retrieve it.

Hopping on board, David rode the lift to the top, and jogged down the tunnel.  He didn't hesitate when he reached the end, but dove into the water, letting the power of the falls push him downward and away.

He swam for almost a half mile around the moat, and then started to look for the particular rock, which was shaped roughly like a star, on the bottom of the moat.  Finding it, he swam through it, as it was just an illusion, blocking the entrance to the tunnel.

Having reached the tunnel's end, David pulled his wand and aimed it at a specific tile above him, then cast a levitation spell silently.  The stone pushed its way up, and slid sideways, so that David could climb out.

Making sure to put the tile back in place, David then dried himself off, and took a moment to catch his breath.  He'd been moving quickly because he felt like things were about to get out of control, but he didn't really have a plan yet.  Woodward Academy wasn't really a place he wanted to be at the moment, but he had no choice.  He was a soldier, and the future of the kingdom was at stake.

Finally, David decided what he was going to do.  First, of course, he had to get out of the secret entrance.  He climbed the stairs, but then cursed when he couldn't remember the spell to open the door.  Annoyed, he just faded through the door into the castle room on the other side of it.

"Now, first things first."

David trotted up the stairs of the north tower of the castle, and came out into the sunshine.  It was a bright day, clear and sunny.  It was only David's mind that felt a storm coming.

"Goliath!" David shouted.  "You are needed!"

The giant gargoyle, which had looked like a statue, turned to look at David, then climbed down off the parapet to stand before David.

"What is it you require of me?" Goliath asked.

"The castle is under siege.  You and your men need to prepare to defend it."

"We stand ready, Vocator.  You have only to give the command."

"Thank you.  The battle could begin at any time."

Goliath nodded, and then climbed back up onto the wall.  Instead of crouching, as he had been doing, he now stood, staring out at the thousands of werewolves surrounding the mountain.  There were so many that, even from their position with the mountain blocking their view of what stood at its base, they could still see the edges of the crowd.

David frowned, but then turned to go back down the tower.  He emerged on the fifth floor, and went directly to the war room.

"Lord Woodward, are you here?" David asked.

Lord Woodward materialized quickly.  "I am.  What news do you bring?"

"The castle is under siege.  It is time for her to wake."

"I understand.  You have but to instruct her."

"How?"

Lord Woodward told him, and David thanked him.  "I don't know what, if anything, the ghosts can do for us, but if you can get their cooperation, it would be appreciated," David said.

"There is little to nothing we can give you other than information," Lord Woodward said.

"Information would be good, but you can't give us that, either.  The weres are using ghost prevention fields."

"Damn," Lord Woodward said.  "Then we are, truly, mere bystanders.  I'm sorry."

"We'll manage," David assured him.

"I'm sure you will."

"If you'll excuse me, I have things to do."

"Of course."

David left the war room, and exited the castle.  He hustled down the stairs to the Academy level, and then had to make a decision.

Security, or administration?

I know I can trust Tanya.  Security it is.

David took a rock lift down to the terrace, and made his way over to Fensterman Hall.  He strode imperiously into the security office.

"David!" Sheila cried in surprise.  "Welcome back!"

"Is she in there?" he asked, somewhat brusquely.

"Yes..." Sheila said.

David stopped at the door, and turned to her.  "Nice to see you, too, by the way."

Sheila smiled at him.

When David entered Tanya's office, she looked up in surprise; Sheila usually knocked first.

"David!" Tanya said.  "What are you doing here?"

"I need you to call the entire security force to the briefing room, immediately."

"Okay... you want the DIRT team, as well?"

"What are they still doing here?  Finals ended on Friday, didn't they?"

"We received an order to keep all the students here until further notice.  Do you know what's going on?"

"Yes.  I'll cover it in the briefing.  And yes, the DIRT team as well.  At once."

"Okay," Tanya said, knowing when an order had been given.  Explanations and pleasantries could wait.

"I'll be in the briefing room," he said, and walked back out of the office.  Tanya set about dispersing pixies with messages.

It took twenty minutes for everyone to make it into the briefing room.

"Is this everyone?" he asked Tanya.

"Yes.  I know, we're short a few.  They're in the infirmary.  Major fight a few days ago."

David grunted, then turned to the assembled group.

"Let me have your attention," David said.  Silence immediately descended.

"For those of you who do not know who I am, my name is Vocator David Stroud, charge officer for Scout Company 1.  I am here on official army business, and this is a military briefing.  If you are in this room, you just got conscripted."

"Now wait just a minute," one of the students said.

"If you refuse, I will have you thrown off the mountain."  He paused for a long moment for effect.  "Into the sea," he concluded.  There were murmurs among the assembled group.

David raised his voice as he continued.  "Surrounding this mountain right now are several battalions of Vrudenan Army troops.  Their intent is the capture of Mt. Woodward.  For reasons I cannot go into due to national security, this cannot be allowed to happen.  As such, you have all just become Mt. Woodward's sole defensive force.  Reinforcements have been sent for, but I have no idea how long it will take them to arrive.  And in any case, they could not get onto the mountain; they would have to fight their way just to get here.

"Be aware that battle could commence at any time.  I would suggest that, if you have weapons, you go get them.  If you feel you need some practice, you go do so.  If you feel like praying... do that first.

"I will have further orders as events unfold.  If you should see anything from the crowd of weres at the foot of the mountain, inform me at once.

"That is all.  You are dismissed."

David left the room with Tanya on his heels.  "Can you really conscript them like that?"

"No, but don't tell them that.  I need all the fighters I can get, and they're going to be the most proficient on campus."

"But if fighting back could get them killed..."

"Tanya, there are three options here.  Fight, hide, and flee.  Fleeing isn't possible, as there are about four thousand werewolves waiting downstairs to tear you apart.  Hiding will only work until they take the mountain, at which point they will search it inch by inch, find you, and you'll be dead - or wish you were - anyway.  That only leaves fighting, where, at worst, you'll die quickly.  At best, you might help save the kingdom.

"In any case, I have orders from the king himself on this issue, and if I need to fib to a few people to carry it out, that's what I'll do."  The king had made it explicit to David that protecting the OmniPortal was an absolute top priority, if it were ever found.

Thinking of that, David realized that he had not yet verified the presence of the OmniPortal, physically.  He conjured up his Dalmajak Cynosure again.

"The location of the OmniPortal, if you please," David told the sphere.

In only a few seconds, it was pointing deep within the mountain.

"Thank you, that will be all," David said.

"What the hell's an OmniPortal?" Tanya said.

"Something you have never heard of.  Ever," David told her firmly.

"Yes, sir," she said with a nod.

"I have work to do.  See if you can get some of the security troops to patrol the rim of the Monster Moat.  Shit, now I wish there were a few more monsters in it."

"Yeah, that'd be a help, wouldn't it?" she asked.

David grunted.  "Keep close to your office to coordinate, so I can find you easily."

"Yes, sir."

"And for fuck's sake stop calling me sir, goddammit!"

Tanya giggled.  "Gotcha."

"And keep your head down.  I've already lost too many friends this year."

Tanya frowned, and then she took David's arm.  He turned to her, and the two kissed tenderly for a very long moment.

"Thanks.  I needed that," he told her.  "Did you find out any more about Dailey?"

"Nothing substantive," she said.  "It's just impossible to do an investigation without being able to actually investigate."

"Yeah, I know.  I didn't have high hopes for success.  I'll have to deal with the problem... more directly now."

"Good luck."

"Thanks.  You, too."

They kissed again, and then went their separate ways.

David made his way back up to the Academy level, and entered Beckett Hall.  He wasn't surprised to find Tracy not at her desk; it was Sunday, after all.  But he heard voices from the office, and so he headed in that direction.  He didn't bother with knocking, but entered the office, to find the dean having a heated discussion with several professors.  He recognized Prof. Do, but the others weren't familiar to him.  He stepped up to the dean's desk, and turned to the professors.

"Leave," he said bluntly.

"Now listen here, young man-" one of them started to say.

David interrupted with, "That was not a request."  His tone of voice indicated that they should probably not argue the point.  Quickly, they departed.  Tracy, who had been in the meeting, taking notes, followed them out.

"...Vocator," Dean Lengel said, both to acknowledge his success, and because it didn't feel right, just then, to refer to him by name.  "Good to see you..."

"You, too.  Ma'am, we have a problem."

"A problem besides discipline even worse than when you were DIRT captain?"

"By several orders of magnitude," David replied.

Dean Lengel frowned.  "What is it?"

"Have you looked outside lately?"

"Other than to note it's a lovely day?  No.  I've been busy.  Why?"

"Because you have about four thousand unwelcome guests at the foot of your mountain."

"Unwelcome guests?"

"Of the furry and fanged variety," David said.

Dean Lengel paled.  "The Vrudenans are here?  Why?"

"I can't tell you that.  It's a secret.  But they will be attacking.  When, I don't know exactly.  I'm not sure why they haven't started already.  Maybe they're waiting for even more troops."

"Vocator, this school has less than fifteen hundred people, and most of those are first- and second-year students."

"They cannot be allowed to fight.  Neither can the third- or fourth-years.  Only citizens can be allowed to take part in battle.  And that must be voluntary on their part.  Though what they think they'll gain by hiding in a corner waiting for the Vrudenans to come find them is beyond me."

"We can't just tell the younger students to go to their dorms... those are completely unprotected!"

"There is a place they can be hidden, for a time.  No place is perfectly safe, but they'll be safe there for the duration of the battle.  If we win, they'll be fine.  If we don't... well, we're all screwed no matter what, if that happens."

"Right."

"I'll need you to call a staff meeting.  I've already briefed the security team and the gargoyles."

"How long have you been here?" she asked.

"You mean you didn't know I'd arrived?" he asked with a grin.

Dean Lengel smirked.  "No, as I said, I've been busy."

"I've been here about an hour.  Feels like four days.  It also feels like four minutes, strangely.  We have to get this place ready.  They're going to come, and they're going to come in force.  And none of your long-range spells are going to do you any good."

"Why not?"

"They're allied with demons, who are using dampening fields."

"You're just full of good news," she said sarcastically.

"Oh, I'm not even done," David told her.

"What else?" she asked, frowning.

"You and I have a problem," David said bluntly.

"Something worse than a werewolf attack?" she asked seriously.

"Much worse, for me personally."

"What is it?"

"Last year, someone told me something about you. Something I don't want to believe. Something I've spent a lot of mental effort trying to reject. Something that, honestly, I'm not ready to deal with. But I can't ignore it at this point. We're expecting a full-on battle here, and I have to know who I can trust, and who I can't."

"And you're not sure you can trust me?" Dean Lengel asked quietly.

"I wish I was. I don't want to believe that you could have betrayed me. I can't believe that the Emile I know would actually do such a thing. The problem is that I was told that the Emile I know is a lie."

"David, I have never..." Emile stopped, and then let out a long sigh before continuing. "No, there's not really much point in me trying to defend myself, is there? I mean, if I was actually lying to you before, there's no reason I wouldn't lie to you now, right?"

"Exactly."

"How can I prove to you that I am your friend? Do you want me to take a truth potion?"

"There's no time to make one. They take days to craft properly, and there isn't any kept here on the campus. No, I want you to do something that is much, much worse than a truth potion."

"What?" she asked, her breath a bit ragged.

"I want you to let me possess you."

"How will that help?" she asked.

"You can't lie to me when you're being possessed. The part of you that crafts lies is bypassed. Your true self is exposed. You will not be able to hide anything from me. You will have no more secrets from me. I will know everything."

Dean Lengel paled slightly. "That's asking a lot. What if I simply stayed out of the battle?"

"That is not sufficient. What I was told was that my entire school career was orchestrated, that everything I've been through here was a set-up, to prepare me for a battle I had to fight last year. If what I was told is true, then you, Sam, every professor here... I can't trust any of you.

"I've been struggling with a way to deal with this for over a year now. With the war taking me away from here, it wasn't so important for me to know for sure. Now, with what's coming, I can't chance it anymore, and I can't wait for a better way to do it."

"If I don't do this?" she asked.

"Then I will be forced to jail all of you in the castle's dungeon, and fight the weres with only myself, the few remaining upperclassmen and the security staff. It won't be enough, and we will almost certainly lose... and you will die when the weres find you, trapped like rats, in the cells."

Dean Lengel grew even paler. "This is that serious to you?"

"I have been betrayed by supposed friends too many times. I have to know that I can turn my back to you safely. It may seem like I'm being melodramatic, but if you have already betrayed me as completely as you've been accused, why would I believe that you won't betray me again during the battle? I don't have the luxury of taking that chance; what we're fighting for here is too important, and I am responsible to the king for protecting this mountain. I'm sorry, I know this is asking a lot of you, but at this point, I have no other choice.  If it matters at all to you, I don't want to do this.  I just don't have any other way to resolve the problem in time."

Dean Lengel nodded, and considered for a long moment.

"All right," she said. "But before we do this, before you see what... well, before you see what's in my head, I want to say, without you forcing it out of me, that I have never faked anything with you, David. Our relationship is real. There are things you are about to learn about me that may make you angry, but please believe this: I never intended you to ever be hurt in any way."

David merely stared at her.

She swallowed, and then said, "So, what do I need to do?"

"Come on," he said.

David led Dean Lengel over to the infirmary, and had her lie down on a bed.

Annie came out of her office, a look of concern on her face. "Are you all right, Emile?" she asked. Coach Hall was with her, and also looked worried.

Dean Lengel explained the situation, while David merely stood looking resolute.

Annie, who knew David well enough to know that he wouldn't be demanding this if it wasn't vital, took it in stride. Coach Hall, on the other hand, didn't like it at all.

"This is outrageous," he said. "That you could even accuse a woman who has been your protector and friend for the last seven years, that you could accept the word of some nobody..." for over a minute, he vented his indignation.

When Coach Hall took a breath, David asked calmly, "Do I need to kick you out of here so that I can have some peace and get this done?"

Coach Hall looked supremely offended. "How dare you! I have every right to... you're not even a student here at the moment, I really cannot understand-"

"Jeff," Dean Lengel said, "Let it go."

Coach Hall stopped and looked at her.

"This needs to happen," she said. "Just deal with it. Better yet, please go inform the faculty that we're going to need to have a meeting shortly... How long should this take, David?"

"Half hour or so," he said.

"Schedule the meeting for an hour from now," Dean Lengel said. "That will give us time to recover."

Coach Hall glared at David, but nodded his assent, and left the room.

"I'm sorry about that," Annie said. "He gets a little hot sometimes."

David shrugged, and turned back to Dean Lengel. "Lay back and close your eyes. Don't move, once you're settled and comfortable. If this goes badly, both of us can get hurt."

Dean Lengel nodded, then lay down on the table. She fidgeted for a moment, trying to get comfortable, but realized her discomfort wasn't physical, so she stopped.

"I'm ready," she told him.

"No you're not," he contradicted her. "But we'll start anyway."

David faded to ghost form, and lay down on the table within Dean Lengel's body.  He took several unnecessary deep breaths, and then exhaled, forcing himself to solid form.  His body rebounded, and his mind entered Emile's...

"Madame Lengel, please come in."

"Thank you, Your Majesty," she said.  She bowed deeply, and then took the indicated chair.

"You know Minister Chalmers, I assume?"

"Quite well, Your Majesty.  We speak regularly."

"Good.  Well, I don't think you'll be aware, we have something of a situation that has come up.  Minister, why don't you explain?"

"Gladly, Your Majesty.  Emile, it's like this.  There's a boy, he's eighteen, just graduated what they call 'high school', in Earth.  Up until last month, a typical techno boy, nothing particularly noteworthy."

"You say up until last month.  What happened last month?"

"He died," the minister said with a straight face.

"Then... why are we here talking about him?"

"Because he didn't quite die all the way," Chalmers said.  "He has become a demighost."

"I see.  That could be a problem."

"Now, now," the king said.  "let's not take that tone right off the bat.  We don't know anything about this boy yet.  I'd like to think that no entire group is a lost cause."

"Yes, Your Majesty," Emile said, though her tone was unconvinced.

"And that, in fact, is what we're here to talk about," Chalmers said.  "I've come up with a plan to perhaps keep our new young demighost from becoming the kind of individual we all cringe at hearing about.  His Majesty has approved the plan, and you play a critical role."

"I see.  What would you have me do?"

"One last piece of business before we wrap up the faculty meeting," Dean Lengel said to the assembled group.  "We have a... particular student coming in this year.  His name is David Stroud.  I would like you all to look out for him.  Encourage him.  Help him along as much as you can.  Take a personal interest, if possible.  Make sure he's doing all right in his studies.  He may be of particular interest to you, Samantha.  In Earth, he studied a subject called 'chemistry', and was particularly adept at it.  I'm told chemistry is akin to potion making for technos."

"Just how much help do you want us to give him?"  Coach Hall asked.

"I'm not asking anyone to falsify grades.  Just pay attention.  If he seems to be struggling, then make your best effort to give him a helping hand."

"And," Sam asked, "Just how personal an interest do you want us to take in him?"

"I'll leave that solely up to each of you.  I barely know him at this point.  I've only met him once.  He seemed polite and interested... if a little annoyed at his current situation."

"Can I ask, why the special interest in this particular student?" Prof. Rutherford asked.

Dean Lengel took a deep breath, and then she said, "He's a demighost."

The rumble through the faculty was immediate, and expected.  Dean Lengel raised her hand.  "All right, all right!  Yes, we all know what demighosts are capable of, and what many of them have done.  This demighost is only eighteen, and he hasn't done anything yet.  What we are trying to do, is to see if we can prevent him from becoming one of those people you regret ever knowing."

"And you think that coddling him will help?" Prof. Quayde snarled.  "Put him in jail and keep him there.  Best thing you can do."

"He is already in jail, Delquin, for a situation that was not of his own making.  It offends me that you consider that acceptable for anyone.  Now, listen.  This little project was created by the Minister of Education, and it has the approval of the king.  If we want to prevent a whole lot of trouble down the line, then maybe putting in a little bit of effort now can help this young man steer himself down the right path.

"Or, look at it another way.  What you teach him will be with him for the rest of eternity.  In a way, you will become immortal by living on in his memories.  All I'm asking is that you be someone he wants to remember.

"In any case, I will leave it up to each of you as to how to act toward young Mr. Stroud.  Another thing, Delquin, and all of you... David's true nature is not to be advertised to anyone.  It will do no good for us to treat him well if he is continually harassed by the school itself.

"That is all."

"Emile, really.  The kid just saved a man's life," Chalmers said.

"I realize that, Gary, and I agree that it's not right that he'll be punished for that.  But I have a school to run.  If I start outright showing favoritism, how is that going to go over down the road?"

"Look, the cat is out of the bag with this one, okay?  Everyone knows what he is.  They have to expect you to treat him differently.  Remember the goal here: trying to keep him on the path of good.  How does it help us if we punish him for doing good?"

Emile sighed.  "So what do you want me to do?"

"Bring him back to the school.  Just let him stay in his dorm room."

"That's it?"

"What else is there?" Gary said.  "It will prevent whatever punishment the magistrate would think up, because he wouldn't be there anymore."

"They'll put him in solitary.  It's pretty much the only thing that would make any sense."

"Well, I don't know about any of that.  What I do know is, if we want to keep this thing moving forward, we can't let him be punished."

"If all you want me to do is bring him back here, I don't have a problem with that.  I'm sure Sam can look after him while he's here, anyway."

Chalmers grunted.  "I think she may have taken things a bit too far."

"I haven't asked her about her motivations where David is concerned.  I don't want to know."

"Right.  In any case, take her along with you.  A friendly face couldn't hurt the boy..."

"Okay.  We'll leave shortly."

"Good.  Thanks for the chat."

"You know he's got a crush on you, don't you?" Sam said with a grin.

"Samantha, really!" Emile said.  "Besides, I don't think it's a crush."

"Right," Sam said, her voice dripping with sarcasm.

"What, he couldn't be seriously interested in me?" Emile asked, slightly offended.

"Oh-ho, so that's how it is," Sam said with a mischievous grin.  "Then why, do you suppose, he's never made a pass at you?"

"Has he ever made a pass at a teacher, ever?" Emile said.

"Not that I'm aware of..."

"And yet he's dated four of you," Emile said.  "I think he'd think it was inappropriate to ask the dean of students for a date, while he's a student."

"And what would the dean of students say, if he did?" Sam prodded with a grin.

"Never you mind, Samantha!"

David pulled himself free of Dean Lengel's mind, and climbed off the table.  He solidified himself and turned to her.  She was struggling to get up, but he put his hand on her chest to hold her down.

"Don't try to move just yet.  It can be a bit disorienting, and you may feel a bit weak for a while."

"Did you see... whatever you needed to see?" Annie asked gently.

David just nodded to her.  Turning to Emile, he said, "I'm sorry for thinking you could have outright betrayed me... though leading me on wasn't exactly nice, either."

"David," she said, and he helped her to a sitting position.  "We didn't lead you on.  You earned what you got at this school."

"Sure.  Because every student who's bright and studious winds up with two apprenticeships, special training, and being the head of a major school department," he said sarcastically.

Dean Lengel blushed.  "When you put it that way, it does sound like rather a lot, doesn't it?"

"Just a touch," he said.

"David... I never gave anyone specific instructions about you.  You know that, now.  I just asked them to look out for you, maybe guide you a little."

"The word is manipulate, Emile," David said crossly.  "I've just replaced one problem with another.  First I thought you'd betrayed me.  Now I have to seriously question whether I've ever earned anything in this world.  If you'll excuse me, I have security operations to check on."

As David left the room, Emile looked at Annie in despair.

"He's right, you know.  He'll never really know, now, what he earned on his own, and what we handed to him because of who he is," Annie said.

"He can't really think that way, can he?" Emile asked, fretting.  "Does he not see how good he is at things?"

"Honestly?  Not really.  With a couple obvious exceptions, he sees himself as average, for a Wizard Adept.  He assumes any skill he has above others comes from the fact that he's had seven years of school."

"I've had eight, and he's a better wizard than me by far," Emile said.

"And me," Annie agreed.  "But you remember what you told me about what he was like when Sam got hexed?  That was typical David.  I don't know how you fix that.  But... at least he doesn't... he thought you'd betrayed him somehow?  What's that about?"

Emile explained briefly.

"Well, at least he knows that's a lie..." Annie said.

"Great, so he trusts me enough to let me get my fool head ripped off by a werewolf.  I think I could do without the honor."

"What's that?" Annie asked.

"Oh, that's right, you don't know."  Emile explained about the coming attack.  She watched her friend go pale.

"I'd better get ready for mass casualties," Annie said.

"That wouldn't be a bad idea," Emile agreed with a frown.  "There's a staff meeting in..."

"I was here, I heard," Annie said with a grin.

"Right.  I'll see you there.  I have things to organize myself."

As Dean Lengel reached the door, Annie called out, "Emile?"

Dean Lengel turned.

"Do you think David will ever forgive us?"

Emile sighed.  "I hope so... but you know, honestly?  I think the answer to that question is probably up to Sam."

Annie nodded, and then Emile turned and left.  Annie looked around in despair at her facility.

"I'm gonna need a bigger infirmary."

A half-hour later, David entered the conference room where staff meetings were held.  He looked around, seeing a lot of worried people.  He sympathized.

"All right, let's take a seat," David said.

"Who put you in charge?" Prof. Hellerhan predictably objected.

"The king.  Sit down and shut up," David snapped.  Hellerhan did as he was told.

"Ladies and gentlemen, let me explain why I am here.  My job with the Callamandian Army is as charge officer - that is, second in command - of Scout Company 1.  My troop was out on a scouting mission when we realized that the Vrudenan Army had targeted Mt. Woodward for capture.

"Now, before anyone asks, yes, I do know why they would want to attack a school.  No, I cannot give you that information, as it is a national security matter.

"What I can tell you is this:  Right now, as we speak, there are approximately four thousand werewolves camped out at the base of this mountain.  At some point in the near future, they are likely to attack.  Now, what does 'near future' mean in this context?  It could mean anything from ten minutes, to three or four days.  I would put the likelihood of them waiting any longer than that as extremely low.  I have sent for reinforcements, and whether the weres know about that or not, they will want to get their operation over with before the army has a chance to interfere.

"I am the only military officer within range of this attack.  I obviously cannot stop four thousand werewolves by myself.  I am asking for your assistance.

"I'm not going to sugar coat this or bullshit you.  This is as dangerous as anything you have ever done in your life.  Some of you are likely to die in the upcoming battle.  Whether or not you choose to fight has to be your choice... but I will say that, if this mountain falls, we are all in deep shit, with no way out.

"I am also asking that you talk to the upperclassmen that you are familiar with.  Any of them that are willing to join the fight, send up to the castle.  That is where we will assemble what forces we have.

"Professor Rutherford, if you and the other elemandy teachers could bring every electricity generator you have up to the castle, that would be appreciated."

Prof. Rutherford nodded.

"We can't expect the Sentinel Trees to hold for very long.  We must assume that the school will be overrun.  The castle is our only real stronghold.  I have already informed Lord Woodward of the impending problem, but the ghosts can't really help us any.  I have acquired the means to activate the castle's defenses, and we will do so at the appropriate time.

"Are there any questions so far?"

Prof. Whitaker asked, "What about the younger students?"

"There is a secret area inside the mountain where we will keep them safe during the battle.  We need to gather them together on the terrace as soon as this meeting is adjourned.  We'll need to provide sleeping facilities for them, as they could be there for several days, and the area in question is completely empty.

"Also, before any of you make up your minds about whether you will join the battle, understand this:  The werewolves have with them several demons.  Those demons, apart from... well, being demons... are using magic dampening spells.  Any long-range spells you might know, will be useless to you.  Energy balls and other close-hand spells are all you're going to have to fight with.  Prof. Teller, I will want you to gather together all of the students and teachers who have weapons skills.  I need to know what I'm working with."

"Yes, sir," Prof. Teller said.

"If you choose to not join in this battle, I understand.  Please join the younger students in the bunker area.  It will keep you out of the way for the duration of the battle.

"Once I see what our own troop strength is, I will create a more detailed plan of action.  Right now, I'm flying blind.  So, get me the information I need, as quickly as possible.

"Now we need to get the students to shelter, and we need to prepare the school grounds for battle," David said to the assembled group.

"This is all blatherskite," Prof. Hellerhan scoffed, rising from his chair. "I don't believe any of your crap, and I'm not going to be ordered around just so you can play soldier boy!"

The other professors rose, but stayed out of the way as David marched over and shoved the professor up against the wall so hard that it actually cracked the plaster. He could have held him there by sheer force of will, but the hand around the professor's throat was added incentive for him not to move.

"As the only military officer at this post, following the direct orders of the king himself, during a time of war," David growled, "I legally speak with his voice. Therefore, what you just said is a punishable act of treason. The penalty for which, during time of war, is immediate execution."

"I never-" Prof. Hellerhan squeaked in fear.

David interrupted him by pulling his wand and pointing it directly into his face. Hellerhan lost the ability to speak out of sheer terror. The energy leaking off David's wand was filling the entire room.

Sparks appeared at the end of David's wand, and everyone knew that Prof. Hellerhan wouldn't be alive for very much longer.

David suddenly closed his eyes and took several deep breaths, trying to calm himself. Slowly, the crackles from his wand died down, and the energy in the room lessened.

"You are doing your level best to put me back on a path I worked very hard to get off of," David said darkly.

"I have-"

"Shut your mouth or I will kill you right now," David barked.

Hellerhan stopped talking.

"I have seen shit in the last year that would drive you completely insane. I have done things that would turn your stomach. I have literally waded in the blood of dead soldiers. Heroes of this country. While you were doing what, you fucking asshole? Sitting here, safe and sound, spewing your crap and feeling superior?"

"Your superiority is at an end. Now. If you challenge my authority again, even slightly, I will execute you on the spot. Do you understand me?"

"Yes," Hellerhan croaked out.

"If you irritate me in any way, shape or form, ever again... well, you might not die, but you'll wish you had. Do you believe me?"

"Yes," he croaked again.

"There are hundreds of students at this school who are in serious danger from the thousands of werewolves outside this school. You will do your part to protect them, or I will feed you to the werewolves myself. Is that clear?"

"Yes," Hellerhan said.

David pulled him off the wall and threw him toward the door. Hellerhan staggered toward the exit as quickly as he could.

"And Hellerhan?" David snapped.

Hellerhan turned around, fearful and shaking.

"When this is all over, I don't ever want to see your whiny motherfucking face ever again. I don't care if you have to move to Milima to make that happen. Understood?"

"Yes," Hellerhan said, his voice quivering.

"Get the hell out of my sight. Now."

Hellerhan bolted from the room as David turned back to the others.

"Now let's get to work," David barked. No one in the room dared argue any further.

As David headed for the door, Sam intercepted him.

"David... it's good to see you're okay," she said.

"Am I?  I'm never sure these days.  If you'll excuse me, I have work to do."

Sam looked after him stricken as he marched out of the room.  Emile came up beside her as everyone else filed out.

"That was very strange," Sam said.

"He knows, Sam."

"Knows what?"

"About the Minister's plan."

Sam frowned.  "How did he find out about that?"

"Have a seat.  We need to talk about it."

"Vivian!" Olissa cried upon seeing her enter the house.  "What are you... where's David?"

Vivian waved her off for a second.  She had actually run most of the last three miles, in order to make up for having to stop and rest for a couple hours during the night.

By the time she could talk, several others had entered the room.

"David is at the Academy," Vivian finally said.  "They are in danger.  I have to file a report.  Oh, and could one of you please go tell Cupcake that David would like her to fly up to the school?"

"I'll do it," Jess said.  "I need to leave for work, anyway."

As Jess left the house, Bispy slipped out with her.  He immediately took to the air; he had a task to perform.

Back in the house, Vivian made her way over to the desk outside David's office and collapsed into the chair.  She pulled out a parchment and an InkyQuill, and started writing.  As she did, she told the others, "The weres are going to attack the school.  David went in to try to get the school ready.  I'm supposed to call in the reinforcements... and then remain here, just in case."

"In case what?" Denise asked.

"Honestly?  I think it's just in case I might have gotten killed up at the school.  I think he wanted me out of the line of fire."

The others murmured about that, while Vivian finished making out her report.  She bundled that up, and then headed to the backyard, where the falconswift was waiting.  After the report was sent off, she asked, "Can I get something to eat, please?"

Olissa said, "Have a seat in the dining room.  I'll make something."

 "Okay, get them all stationed around the Monster Moat.  Tell them to stick near the Sentinel Trees, both to break up their outline, and for protection.  We don't want the Vrudenans trying to pick them off," David said.

"From the bottom of the mountain?" Tanya scoffed.

"At this point, Tanya, don't assume anything is impossible.  I'm a damned Vocator in the damned army, after less than a year, and I'm now tasked with leading the single most important battle of the war with a bunch of civilians.  You had better fucking hope that nothing is impossible!"

Tanya frowned, and nodded.  "We'll get on it.  Sheila is coordinating, and she has a pixie dedicated, so she'll report to you immediately if we see anything."

"Good deal."

"...Aren't you going to say dismissed?" Tanya asked with a smirk.

"Keep it up, and I may administer some physical discipline," David replied with a growl.

Tanya giggled, and headed off to do what she'd been instructed to.

Sam, who had been standing quietly at the door, finally came in.

"David?"

David looked up, frowning when he saw her.  He turned back to looking at his outlined plan.  "What is it, Sam?"

"David, we need to talk."

"If it's not about how to keep werewolves from attacking a thousand defenseless students, I don't think we have the time," David said.

"David, please.  We've been friends for eight years now.  I think I deserve a little bit of consideration..."

David turned and dropped his clipboard on the desk, then turned around and leaned back against the desk.  Crossing his arms, he asked, "Have we?"

"Have we what?"

"Been friends for eight years.  Or is that just what I was supposed to believe?"

Sam flinched.  She understood David's anger, but to have him be so direct, so aggressive, and so upset with her was a new and unpleasant experience.  She took two steps closer to him.  He could see the tears in the corners of her eyes.

"David, you know she never told us to lie to you.  I've never said anything to you I didn't mean.  The truth is, after about the first... oh, what, like three weeks of class... Dean Lengel's urging was unnecessary.  You were an excellent student, who was highly motivated in my class.  If you had been anybody with the skills you have, I would have offered them an apprenticeship."

"And the rest?" David demanded coldly.

Sam frowned, and tears started to leak down her face.  "There is only one thing about our personal relationship I have ever lied to you about."

"What's that?" he asked.

"I did, once, consider asking you to stay with me, to become my partner.  I realized it wouldn't work, because you would be gone in just a few years, and I didn't want to face the breakup that would cause."

"And when was this?" David asked.

"When you got your potions mastery.  I was very lonely after that, for quite a while.  You and I grew apart, and I wanted you back in my life."

"You didn't say anything," David replied.

"I couldn't.  You had your own life to live.  You had an education to work on, a career to build.  You didn't need to hang around with some old woman."

"And just how am I supposed to believe you now?" David asked.  His tone wasn't harsh, but the question was direct.

For a long moment, Sam looked off to the side.  Finally she turned back and said, "You could possess me, like you did Emile."

"You don't understand what that would mean," David said.  "I had access to every single dirty secret Emile has ever had.  The only thing that keeps me from knowing all of it is that I didn't have three days to keep hold of her."

Sam stepped closer to David.  "David, I have only ever had one secret that I was specifically hiding from you.  You learned that one thing from Emile.  While there's plenty of things I have never told you, I wouldn't care if you knew them, they've just never come up."  She stepped right up to him now, and slid her arms around his chest.  He didn't pull away from her.

Sam laid her head on his chest and the two were quiet for a long moment.  David finally slipped his arms around her, resting his hands on her lower back.  They stayed that way for several minutes.

David finally leaned back, and Sam looked into his eyes.  He slid his hands up to her shoulders and held her, then kissed her, hard.  She melted against him, and immediately acquiesced when his tongue requested entrance into her mouth.  For another long time, they stood there, kissing.

Finally, David let her loose.

"So... how do we do this possession thing?" Sam asked seriously.

David shook his head.  "We don't."

"Why-"

"I'm going to choose to believe you.  For all you've meant to me over the last eight years, I'm going to trust that you're not lying to me, that we really do mean something to each other."

More tears spilled down Sam's face, and she kissed him this time, just as hard.  When they pulled apart this time, she smiled for a moment, then frowned.

"What?" David asked.

"I don't know how far I can push your tolerance... I just want to say that I never heard of anybody at the school treating you special on a personal level.  There were a few things that happened academically, but even that was help.  Nobody that I know of was grading you on a curve or anything like that."

"Not true," David said.  "Quayde was definitely grading me on a curve."

Sam smirked and chuckled.  "I'm not sure a straight line at zero counts as a curve, David."

David shrugged.  "Why did you all feel the need to hide it from me?  Why not just tell me, 'Hey, we're going to try out a special program with you, and see if it helps?'"

"I wasn't in charge of that, David."

"You could have told me yourself..."

"And get in trouble with the king?  Besides, since I wasn't actually acting on that plan with you, I didn't consider it important."

"You didn't consider her words even a slight push to befriend me?" David chided.

"To befriend you, yes.  To bed you, no.  That was done entirely because you were, and are, a wonderful person."

"'Were,' I'll grant you.  'Are' might be a bit iffy these days," David told her.

"I don't believe that for a second.  Speaking of bedding you..." she said, rubbing her hands over his chest, "do we have time..."

David grinned.  "It sounds like fun, and I could use the stress relief, but I don't think it would go over well with the king if I was found to be boffing my potions master when the war kicked into high gear."

"Aw," Sam pouted.  "Well, okay, you get back to your war."  She kissed David passionately again.  When she turned to go, David grabbed her hand, and turned her back to look at him.

"I would have said yes," he told her.

She smiled softly.  "I know.  That's why I chose not to ask."  She gave him another short kiss, then turned to go.  He let her, this time.

"Mistress, could you come with me, please?" Olissa asked Zyla.  Zyla was in the sun room.  She'd been watching Grace play with Eirwyn.

"Are you ever going to stop calling me that?" Zyla groaned.

"When you reject David and leave here for the last time, yes.  Then I will call you... something else."

Zyla grunted as she entered the second-floor lounge.  When she did, she stopped dead.  There were a whole bunch of people, a lot of whom she didn't know.

"Please sit down," Olissa said, directing her to a chair.

Zyla sat down, and then said, "What's going on?"

Denise stood up and walked around the couch opposite where Zyla was sitting.  She put her hands on the back of the couch, and said, "After our little chat a couple weeks ago, I realized that you really didn't know who you were in a relationship with.  I had assumed, obviously wrongly, that David would have told you about all the things that had happened in his life.

"Before you make any decisions at all about whether you're going to continue to date him, whether you're going to keep him in your life, I think it's important you understand where he's coming from, what he's been through.  These ladies are here to help me with that.

"Jenny?" Denise said, motioning to the pretty blonde girl sitting to Zyla's right.

Jenny rose.  She had something in her hand that Zyla couldn't make out.  It looked disturbingly like a metal butt plug, only rather more pointed.

"My name is Jenny Bishop.  David and I went to high school together, back in Earth.  We didn't hang around each other.  He was kind of a bookworm... not a nerd, but he was smart, and I was a cheerleader.  Anyway...

"At the end of our senior year, my brother and I, well... we did something stupid.  We decided to prank someone.  We picked David."

"Why?" Zyla asked.

"Why... what?" Jenny replied.

"Why David?  I'll assume that you decided to prank someone because you were immature teenagers who didn't know better, but why David?"

"He said hi to me in the halls a few days before graduation."

"That's it?  He was polite, and so you decided to prank him?"

"Had to pick someone.  That was the only person who stuck out in my mind.  And he was, as I said, a bookworm.  Not exactly highly regarded in my circle of friends."

"Uh-huh.  So what happened?"

Jenny stepped forward and handed the object in her hand to Zyla.  It was a metal spire, about four inches long and two inches wide at its base.

"That happened."

Zyla turned it over in her hands, and then looked up in incomprehension.

"What is this?"

Denise said, "That's the thing that killed David."

Zyla dropped it as if it were hot.  "My god, why would you give me that?"

"To show you what he went through... or in this case, what went through him," Jenny said.  "We didn't mean to kill him.  We didn't mean to even hurt him.  It was just supposed to be a prank.  Things went wrong."  Jenny bent down and picked up the spire.  "This was the decoration on top of a bird cage.  The cage was sitting on a table, in a room.  David fell through the rotting floor in the room above.  This pierced his back and... well, I don't know what it did internally, but it killed him."

"I've seen the scar, but I never..." Zyla held out her hand and Jenny gave her the spire again.  She looked at it.

"Does David know what you did?"

"Oh, yes.  David paid all of us back, in one way or another."

"What... did he do to you?"

Zyla didn't understand Jenny's smirk.  "He fucked me in the shower."

"What?" Zyla asked in confusion.

"To get David to the old house, I told him we were going to have sex to celebrate graduating.  After... he died, one night, he showed up in our house.  I was taking a shower.  He pushed me up against the wall, and... we had sex."

"He raped you," Zyla said.

"I didn't struggle real hard to stop him," Jenny said.  "I was more confused and freaked out than anything.  He was invisible at the time, so I had no idea what was going on."

"Why the hell are you here, if he did that to you?  Why would you want to help him?"

"Because without him, I'd be dead by now."

Zyla shook her head.

"While David was a Rimohr, we ran into each other again.  By that point, I was a junkie.  I was hooked on cocaine, about to be kicked out of college, had no friends, no family that would talk to me...

"David got me into rehab.  After rehab, he got me a job.  He got me clean, and he's helped me stay that way.  I was at rock bottom, Zyla.  Without him, I would not have lived this long."

"Why did he do that?" Zyla asked.  "He can't like you very much..."

"We're friends now, but I still don't really know why he helped me that night.  He said it was because..." Jenny blushed, "I was fun in the shower."

Zyla couldn't prevent herself from giggling.

Jenny then turned.  "Amanda?"

Amanda stood up.  "My name is Amanda Master.  I started Woodward Academy the same year David did.  We were in a class together.  Spring semester, we started going out."

Amanda approached Zyla.  She too handed her an object.  This one was a simple rock, roughly the size of a golf ball.

"What's this?" Zyla asked.

"David was outed accidentally in September of his first year.  This is one of the hundreds of rocks that were thrown at him that year.  He was hexed, morphed, called names, pelted with rocks, pranked... near the end of the year, his tormentors hexed one of the rock lifts, and David took an eighty-foot fall into the moat."

"My god."

"And back then, David hadn't yet invented his pain potion," Gwen said.  "He spent his healing days suffering.  In fact, when he fell into the moat, he couldn't even wake up for a day, because the pain kept making him pass out."

Zyla frowned.  "If the school hates him this much... why did he continue?"

"First, let me tell you that I ended up breaking up with him, because, while I was dating him, they were doing the same kinds of things to me.  I ended up in the infirmary because they poisoned me.  I just couldn't take it anymore.  That was... like two months?  David put up with this crap for almost the entire year.

"Then, near the end of the year, David's primary enemy, Marcus, decided to have it out with David.  He took me as a hostage - he didn't know David and I had broken up - and then threatened to kill me if David didn't bow down to him."

"What was his name?" Zyla asked.

"Marcus."

"His last name," Zyla emphasized.

"Savolar," Gwen spat.  She didn't understand the sudden angry look that came to Zyla's face.

"Go on," Zyla told Amanda.

"David... well, you know there was no way David was going to bow to anyone who wasn't the king.  The two fought it out.  David won."

Gwen said, "After that, things settled out.  Especially the following year, the school mostly left David alone."

Zyla nodded.

"Which is not to say," Olissa started, "That David's second year went smoothly."

"What happened?" Zyla asked.

"He met a girl who wanted to date him," Olissa said.  "The only problem was, she was grade-A certifiably insane.  She tried to break up both of his relationships that year..."

"Wait, he had two girlfriends?"

"Not at the same time.  He dated Rose Waters as a result of Sex Ed class.  Come to that, he dated Devyn because of Sex Ed class, too.  His relationship with Rose was very short.  They decided they weren't compatible.  Devyn he dated for several months."

Gwen said, "Until Cherise put Olissa into the infirmary."

"What?" Zyla gasped.

"She poisoned me with Gelert Potion, which put me to sleep until David was able to bring me out of it, almost a month later."

"That was the first time David's dark side nearly took over," Gwen said.

"What happened?" Zyla asked.

"When he saw what she'd done to Olissa, David nearly choked Cherise to death."

"What stopped him?"

Gwen shrugged.  "I don't think he'd absorbed enough shit in his life to that point, that it could defeat his inherent good side."

"How did this event break up his relationship with Devyn?" Zyla asked.

"David spent the entire time I was unconscious, in the infirmary with me, trying to find a cure.  Devyn... objected."

"Imagine that," Zyla replied sardonically.

"Zyla, David wasn't my boyfriend until our sixth year.  We had sex from time to time, but never a relationship.  I wasn't trying to break up David and Devyn."

Gwen said, "But Devyn refused to see that.  She not only broke up with David, but held a grudge for the next two years, until she graduated in her fourth year, and then went back to Chasco.  Actually, the feud extended beyond that, until David ended up arresting her for trying to buy a slave."

Zyla frowned mightily at that.

"And then we come to David's third year.  I tried to get Prof. Fibblebitz to come tell you about it, but she absolutely refused, saying that it was far too painful for her to even think about David still," Denise said.

"Wait... she's dead," Olissa said.  "How did you even find her at all?"

"Long story.  Ask me later," Denise said.  Olissa nodded.

Picking the story back up, Gwen said, "In his third year, David had the misfortune of having Delquin Quayde as a conjuring instructor.  Quayde hated David.  He made his life a living hell.  He sent him to detention virtually every week.  He pranked him several times.  Though it was never proven, we believe he dumped a vat of boiling oil over David's head.  And then, when it all came to a head, he nearly killed Jailla."

"Did David kill Prof. Quayde?" Zyla asked.

"David was too distraught yet to be angry.  He was worried about Jailla.  But when Prof. Fibblebitz found out about what Quayde had done, she was livid.  She went and attacked him herself, saving David the trouble.

"Ultimately, because what he'd done was against the law, Quayde agreed to leave the school instead of David calling the Rimohrs on him." Gwen said.

"But that didn't end his trouble for the year," Olissa carried on.  "David and Lise - sorry, Prof. Fibblebitz - "

"Her name was Lise?" Zyla asked, interrupting.

"Louisa.  David called her Lise," Olissa confirmed.

"He has talked about Lise quite a bit... he really loved her."

Olissa nodded.  "And she loved him, but she couldn't handle being in a relationship with him, because... well, for reasons that all boiled down to, because he was a demighost.  She didn't hate him for being a demighost, but certain traits of being a demighost, like not being able to father children, were things she couldn't tolerate.

"In any case, when the school asked her to take a position over at Madchen Hall, she broke it off with David, instead of asking him to follow her to the new school.  David was devastated.  He didn't talk to anyone for days on end."

"Just days?  You people keep insisting that my leaving him would hurt him for years," Zyla said.

"Two things," Gwen said.  "Did he tell you when Lise died?"

Zyla swallowed hard.  "In vivid detail."

"David still loved her.  His pain might not have been right on the surface, but he hadn't yet recovered from losing her."

"And the other thing?" Zyla prompted.

"His love for you makes it look like he considered Lise a friendly acquaintance," Gwen said.

Zyla frowned.

Olissa said, "It was between our third and fourth years that David took me on a trip to Mirelia, to see the five temples.  That's when I had my visions, the ones that told me that I was supposed to be his slave, and... someone else... was to be his wife."

"Me?" Zyla demanded.

"You know I'm not going to answer you, Mistress.  Please stop asking."

"But you're clear on your visions?  They definitely showed you a second woman."

"My visions showed me several things.  But to answer your question directly, yes, it was absolutely certain to me that there was a woman in the relationship more important than me."

Zyla frowned, and sat silent.  Seeing that, Gwen carried on.

"I want to back up a little.  Because of how David feels about the folks at Woodward just now, we didn't dare contact any of them.  I'd have loved to have Prof. Stott and Prof. Arpilla here, both of whom have dated David heavily.  Prof. Stott was David's potions master and friend.  Cat... had some kind of family problem.  I never got a good explanation of it, but I know that David was helping her out with it," Gwen said.

Olissa said, "She was in a custody battle with her husband.  David was helping her to fight him.  In the end, she got custody of the kids, and the father had to give up parental rights."

"Wow," Zyla said.  "That's some fight."

"David is very good at solving problems," Denise said.  "You have to know that by now."

Zyla nodded.

Anne, who had come up from Cormatsen, now spoke up.  "In his third year is when David and I started interacting, like I told you before.  We didn't really socialize in his third year, but all of us students knew he and Quayde were going round and round.  Despite that, he still tried to look out for me and save me from myself."

Zyla nodded again.

Olissa said, "In David's fourth year, it almost looked like things would settle down.  He got his potions mastery in September, I think it was... or October, one or the other.  Anyway, it was at that point that he and Prof. Stott grew apart slightly, since they weren't seeing each other so regularly."

Gwen picked it up.  "Then the thefts started happening."

Zyla shook her head, not understanding.

Gwen said, "Someone on campus was stealing things from dorm rooms.  They weren't leaving any clues at all.  Well, that fact, along with some help from one of David's detractors, meant that the school was looking at David suspiciously again."

"He wasn't, though."

"Of course not," Gwen said.  "What would David need to steal for?  No, but he did start helping the Rimohrs and the security team, trying to figure out who was trying to frame him."

"Did they ever find out?" Zyla asked.

"Yeah.  It was his supposed best friend and roommate."

"Oh, geez," Zyla moaned.

"David took that particularly hard.  I think he wanted to beat Jim's face to a pulp, but managed to control himself."

"Then he went to jail," Denise said.

"I remember that," Zyla said.  "For... hurting the man who hurt the teacher."

"The teacher in question was Prof. Arpilla.  She had tried to date someone other than David, and that guy turned out to be a total ass.  David... well..."

Zyla said quietly, "Nobody hurts my family."

Everyone else in the room said, "Exactly."

"And now we're up to his fifth year," another woman said.  "My name is Chloe Kirkland.  I'm a Rimohr.  I worked with David, and your late husband.  My condolences on your loss."

"Thank you," Zyla said.

"In our fifth year, the school created the Discipline Response Team.  In the course of our first meeting, David got elected as captain of the team.  No surprise, really, is it?"

"No," Zyla agreed.

"Anyway, we had one major threat.  The Clan."

"I know about The Clan," Zyla said coldly.  "They nearly killed my husband before the war had a chance."

"What you may not know," Chloe said, "was that The Clan had been formed specifically to target David."

"What?"

"The man behind The Clan had run into David during David's early days in the management facility.  He spawned a plan to hurt David.  That plan was to form a gang that would terrorize the school and the surrounding area.  The Clan.  That man is now in Barnard Hill."

"David didn't kill him, either?" Zyla asked.

"David was... more stable back then," Olissa said.  "Oh, he wanted to kill Beckel, but before he had that chance, he made sure there were other Rimohrs with him, so that there would be people to stop him."

Chloe said, "But before that happened, there was the battle between The Clan, and the security department at Woodward, led by David.  Seventeen people died.  And some people in authority were actually blaming David for what happened."

"That's ridiculous," Zyla objected.

"Absolutely.  Didn't stop them from doing it.  I think that may have been part of what drove him to become a Rimohr.  He was tired of dealing with the petty bureaucrats at the school."

Vivian, who was standing off to one side, chimed in.  "He mistakenly thought the Rimohrs were better."

Chloe and Vivian both snorted.

"I know he struggled with his boss at the office."

"His first one, yeah," Vivian said.  "Wilson was an ass, and everyone knew it.  The only difference was, David repeatedly called him on it.  It says all that needs to be said that, when Wilson complained, David was given more freedoms, and Wilson was reassigned."

"I think you probably have something of a handle on his two years in the Rimohrs, and you know better than any of us what has happened during the war," Gwen said.  "Realize your boyfriend is a guy who has - literally - had his head blown off to honor his commitments.  He mangled his arm to save someone," Gwen said, motioning to Vivian.  "David will do whatever he has to, in order to help his friends and family.  Frankly, after all the crap he's been through, can you blame him for going a bit ape during the war?  Can you blame him for wanting as much compassion and companionship as he can grab?"

"There's one last thing," Vivian said.  "I don't know if it will make any difference to you or not."

"What?" Zyla asked.

"You saved David's soul."

"I don't understand," Zyla said.

Vivian related the events at the were encampment to all of them.  They all looked a little wan.

"Ultimately, the only thing that stopped him was your face.  You saved my life, and the lives of all of those children... and frankly, probably about fifty thousand weres and who-knows how many people... and you saved David.

"I know you're struggling with David's lifestyle, and all of this, but... dammit, how much more does the man have to love you before you can overcome that?"

They all knew there wasn't anything more to be said after that.  They all started to leave.  Zyla suddenly ran after one of them.

"Olissa!  Wait!"

Olissa turned.  "Yes, Mistress?"

"Well, for starters, could you stop calling me that?"

"You are still my master's partner.  What else should I call you?"

"How about 'Zyla'?"

"That would be inappropriate."

"Well, can we at least settle on something other than 'Mistress'?"

Olissa thought for a moment.  "I am comfortable calling you 'ma'am'.  Is that acceptable to you?"

"Not really, but it's better than 'Mistress'.  Thank you."

Olissa nodded.  "Was there something more, Ma'am?"

"I wanted to ask you about your visions."

Olissa frowned.  "I have already told you, I am not going to tell you whether you are the one I saw or not."

"Please, I just want to know, did you know that Joe was going to die?"

Olissa paused and thought carefully.  Finally she said, "Okay, I will answer that, because I can do so without revealing anything.

"No, I did not know that Joe was going to die.  Now, that is either because you are not the person in my vision, and so it wouldn't show me anything about your husband, or the vision simply didn't tell me how you came to be 'available' to David.  I will not tell you which of those things is true."

Zyla nodded.  "I understand, but that's good enough, thank you."

"You're still leaving, aren't you?" Olissa asked.

Zyla frowned.  "I honestly don't know what to do, Olissa.  I'm torn.  One part of me says I deserve a husband who is mine, not 'ours'.  But every time I listen to all of you talk about him...  I just don't know.  I worry that I'm going to try with him, only to find out a year from now that I just can't handle it.  And that's going to hurt him more, me more... it will devastate Grace even worse than me leaving now...  How am I supposed to decide?"

Olissa stood for a long moment.  Zyla could tell she was trying to come to a decision.  After a minute, she finally spoke.

"I have something that could potentially help you... but there is a risk to it."

"What is it?"

"I own an Orb of Sentiment."

"I'm not familiar," Zyla said.

"The Orb of Sentiment can tell you how potential events will make you feel."

"What do you mean?"

"The orb is related to the Remember Orb we use during Yuletide.  The way it works is, you give it a list of events you wish to experience.  They don't have to be current events, or even real events.  Then, when the trance-state starts, the orb causes you to live those experiences, so that you will understand how they make you feel."

"You said there was a risk?"

"Unlike with the Remember Orb, where you always know that you're in an illusion, the Orb of Sentiment will cause you to lose all sense of your true reality, for the time you're inside the orb.  You will have memories that fit the scene the orb has created.  You will live your orb experience.  If that experience causes emotions negative enough, the effects can linger... they can affect you permanently.  Many people who have used the orb to see the wrong kinds of things have gone on to ultimately commit suicide.  More have wound up in counseling for years.  This is very potent divinatory magic.

"Also, understand that the events you see are not in any way truth.  You must tell the orb what to show you.  The divination going on is not about the events, it is about your reaction to them."

"I don't understand how this would help me.  And why do you have this thing, anyway?"

"For the same reason I'm suggesting you use it.  I bought it as a final check on whether or not I should become David's slave.  I wanted to know how I would feel if I did, and if I didn't.

"Here I am."

"So, you want it to tell me how shitty I'll feel if I leave David."

"If you would feel shitty.  It cannot dictate your emotional state.  It can only make you live out the scenario so you'll know for yourself."

"I wouldn't know how to write out the... script?  What would you call it?"

"It is, in fact, called a script.  And, if you like, I can write it for you.  Or you can study the handbook that came with the orb, and write your own."

"If you wrote it, would I be able to understand it?  In other words, could I look it over before we used it?"

"Yes, it's in normal English.  It's just that you have to be specific about the wording you use when crafting the scripts."

"Okay... then... could you write up a script for me?"

"Come to my room.  We should do this now."

Zyla frowned, but knew that hesitating wouldn't make the situation easier.  And who knew?  It might actually help her decide.

Zyla sat on Olissa's bed while Olissa wrote up the script.  When she was finished, Olissa handed it to Zyla to look over.

Zyla read over the list repeatedly.

Olissa said, "Anything you wish to add to it, Ma'am?  Or take off?"

"Why did you choose these specific... uh... 'events'?"

"I tried to balance things.  With David, and without him.  I tried to cover short, medium, and long-range times.  And, because of David's struggles, I thought it might help if you knew how you felt if he changed jobs."

Zyla nodded.  "So... now what?"

Olissa bent down and opened a wooden box.  Out of it, she pulled a one-foot glass orb.  In it was a blue mist, swirling and spinning slowly.  The orb sat on a simple wooden base with four silver horns to hold the orb in place.  Olissa set it on her desk.

"Are you ready, Ma'am?" she asked.

Zyla said, "What do I do?"

"You just sit there.  In fact, once I activate the orb, you won't be able to do anything else."

"How long will this take?"

"That varies quite a bit.  I will check on you from time to time.  This can take days."

"How will you explain that to Grace?" Zyla said, panicky.

"I will tell her you're doing her Uncle David a favor, and that you asked me to look after her while you were unavailable.  I don't expect yours to take quite that long, Ma'am.  Yours will probably only be the rest of today."

"Oh.  Well...  Okay, I guess," Zyla said with a sigh.

Olissa nodded, then turned to the orb.  She chanted a spell, then read off the script verbatim from the page.

Looking over her shoulder at Zyla, she finished the spell, then stepped to one side.

"Your last chance to stop," Olissa said.

Zyla breathed deeply, then shakily nodded and said, "Go ahead."

Olissa tapped the glass of the orb.

David stood on top of the castle's north tower, looking down.  Suddenly, he looked up into the sky.

"Oh, shit," he said.

"What's the matter?" Emile said.  She, Lord Woodward, Goliath, and Tanya were all there, watching.

"It's a full moon tonight."

"What's that mean?" Tanya asked worriedly.

"Feral wolves," Lord Woodward muttered, "crazed and dangerous."

David nodded.

"What's he talking about, David?" Emile asked.

"Werewolves are force-turned at the height of the full moon.  And when that happens, they go feral.  They are vicious, unreasoning creatures.  They don't really think clearly, but they will attack almost anything that moves.  I don't know if this was their plan, or if they really are waiting for reinforcements, but there is almost no chance that they're not about to attack us."

At just that moment, a horrendous set of howls and growls rose from the base of the mountain.

His voice quivering, David said, "Here they come."